Alice, this is my first winter

of waking without you, of knowing

that you, dressed in familiar clothes

are elsewhere, perhaps not even

conscious of our anniversary.The tone creates a contrast between anger and sadness from the disappointment that she may have forgotten him.

Despite using direct address and personal pronouns to address his wife, the reader is still unknowledgeable as to whether she is aware of his directory.

The author is consciously ambiguous as to whether his wife is dead or alive.

The initial reaction from the reader is one of empathy as pathos is created through the writer’s language: he is portrayed as heart broken and lonely without his wife.

Have

you noticed? The earth’s still as hard,

the same empty gardens exist; it is

as if nothing special had changed,

The images of winter are reinforced by the bleak and sombre descriptions of the ‘hard’ earth and ‘empty’ gardens. These highlight the authors melancholy emotions that are absorbed into his surroundings. Moreover, the choice of earth reignites the idea of her death as it could hint she is buried.

The gardens symbolise the author as they act as a double meaning: they personify the author’s ‘empty’ emotions whilst displaying the absent change in his life.

This could suggest that her loss feels even more noticeable as she is the only change in his life.

The question may have been used to emphasise that, despite no longer being together, nothing has changed which implies she may have unjustly blamed the author for the problems in their relationship.

I wake with another mouth feeding

from me, yet still feel as if

Love had not the right

to walk out of me.

The phrase ‘another mouth feeding’ suggests that the author has a new partner and that perhaps they’re kissing. However, the verb ‘feeding’ also proposes that she is having an unwanted draining/consuming effect on him.

The personification of love raises the question as to whether the wife has left him on purpose. Still, ‘not the right’ implies anger with the wife because ‘walk out of me’ emphasises his emptiness as emotion has “left” him

A year now. So

what? you say. I send out my spies.

to discover what you are doing. They smile,

return, tell me your body’s as firm,

you are as alive, as warm and inviting

as when they knew you first ...

The ‘spies’ could be mutual friends or perhaps simply his memories. However, they emphasise that only they know her now. This along with the tone used for them portrays them as sly, as perhaps they are attracted to her or he is paranoid that they are. For example, the repetition of ‘as’ and rhyme of ‘return’ and ‘firm’ reinforces that she has “moved on” or is unchanged without him. Yet, the phrase ‘send out’ makes the author sound oppressive and manipulative as it sounds like an order.

The use of an ellipsis could imply he wants to forget what his ‘spies’ have said as he doesn’t want to confront the truth.

The idea that her memory is like a ghost is contradicted by description of ‘firm’, ‘alive’, ‘warm’ and ‘inviting’ which portrays a creation of pain and sorrow that the author tries to ignore.

Perhaps it is

the winter, its isolation from other seasons,

that sends me your ghost to witness

when I wake.

The repetition of ‘perhaps’ and other similar adverbs, such as ‘yet’, connote confusion as the author is unable to articulate or understand his emotions.

The author uses winter more explicitly as a metaphor to symbolises his feelings of isolation. Yet, his tone also implies a natural sense of blame suggesting that he unable to take responsibility for the disintegration of his marriage.

The metaphor of ‘ghost to witness’ implies that he feels that his wife or her memory has a haunting effect on him. This could be symbolic of the impact of her loss as he feels she has disappeared from his life. However, it may resonate an image of guilt to the reader and echo the possibility she is dead.

Somebody came here today, asked

how you were keeping, what

you were doing.

The pronoun ‘somebody’ demonstrates that life feels of little importance for the author without his wife and therefore he is unable to take notice of others.

The tone of this anecdote could be perceived as angry. This is because the repetition of ‘you’ might imply a feeling of irritation as he feels agitated that people don’t care about he is ‘keeping’ or what he is ‘doing’.

I imagine you,

waking in another city, touched

by this same hour. So ordinary

a thing as loss comes now and touches me.

This shows the final predicament of the poem as the author shows that ‘loss’ has become a consumption of his ‘ordinary’ everyday life.

The repeated personification of time touching the author and his wife highlights, like One Flesh, the juxtaposition in the relationship as all they share now is time, yet his time has become a ‘loss’ that he can see “approaching” to imprint his life.

This continued display of the author imaging his wife suggests that he’d rather feel disconnected from reality in order to have any emotional fulfilment. This implies that the memories of their relationship are not powerful enough to fulfil the void of his loneliness. This could be symbolic of their previous detached relationship or his present isolation as perhaps the recycling of his memories can no reincarnate his feelings about his wife.

Title

Song for last year’s wife

The noun ‘song’ implies to the reader that the poem could be about something passionate, positive and celebratory. This is therefore immediately contrasted by the realisation that the poem is instead mournful of a lost wife.

The title is highly ironic as it makes marriage seem temporary and trivial, much like the impression conveyed in My Last Duchess. However, we soon discover that the author is still, in fact, deeply in love with his wife.

Like My Last Duchess, the phrase ‘last year’s’ suggests that the wife could be dead. However, it also poses a possible possessiveness about the relationship that is later echoed in the poem. It also foreshadows the disconnection in the relationship as the wife now only belongs to time.

Imagery● Winter — the poet uses winter as an extended metaphor to symbolise

that he has grown cold and dead since his wife left , conversely the season is mirroring his emotions and feelings.

● Ghost — the poet uses the metaphor of the ghost to symbolise the haunting effect his wife has had on him since leaving. It also extends the emotional loss displayed in the poem, but also, perhaps, the ambiguity of her death.

● Time — time is a recurring theme that is centralised within the poem through the poet’s imagery. This could be because he want to emphasise the particular effect it has physiologically in contributing to the emotions after a divorce.

Rhyme SchemeFree verse is used to allow the poem to follow the rhythm of natural speech which emphasises the emotions conveyed in the dramatic monologue. This is because it frees the poem to find its own shape according to what the poet wants to say.

ToneThere is a juxtaposition in the tone of the author as he sounds intimate but also empty and melancholy. Moreover, at other points his tone take on an angry manner as he sound irritated with his wife for leaving him isolated without appearing to care.

Structure and Form● Dramatic monologue — the poet uses a dramatic monologue in

order to solely express the husband’s point of view which emphasises his solitariness: there is a narrative within the text of the story of his emotions after his divorce. It places emphasis on the subjective qualities of the poem and its author that are left to the audience to interpret.

● Enjambment and caesura — could reflect the separation in the relationship and the author’s inability to control his emotions.

● No division of stanzas — could suggest that the poet is confused about his feelings and thoughts, but he cannot stop thinking about his wife.

Themes● Love — The speaker talks about his partner in a complementary manner

despite her leaving him suggesting he still loves her and always has.● Loss — The poem is about how the speaker has been left by his partner

whom he deeply loved causing him great loss shown by “Love had not the right to walk out of me.”

● Death —Although the poem is not about the speakers’ partner dying there are a lot of references to death such as “sends me your ghost” and the mournful tone the poem is written in. As she hasn’t died this gives the impression that speakers wants the audience to feel like part of him or her has died.

Links to other poems● My Last Duchess —Similar due to both the speakers having lost their

partner and relationship.● Our Love Now — Similar because one person in the relationship still

loves the partner but the other person appears to have given up on the relationship.

● Sonnet 116 —They contrast because Sonnet 116 implies marriage and love is eternal, but in Song for Last Year’s Wife they’ve broken up yet the speaker in this poem seems to hold similar views to the speaker in Sonnet 116 that love is eternal and despite the cause indestructible, or perhaps even deathless.