CHAPTER III

PHASE I
 CHAPTER III
Phase I

The first Phase of Seamus Heaney’s poetry consists of poems

written between 1966 and 1975 which includes Death of a Naturalist

(1966), Door into the Dark (1969), Wintering Out (1972) and North

(1975). Most of the poems published in these anthologies are more

or less similar in respect of stylistic strategies such as foregrounding

in terms of diction and a deep concern with the texture of sounds.

We find that in this Phase Seamus Heaney was consciously

hammering out in terms of language his own ways of perception as

though he wanted to look at the world, particularly look around in

his own country and look back to die history and Irish conventional

agricultural methods deeply rooted in the tradition in a completely

fresh and original manner. In die Listener dated 8th November 1973

Heaney, while answering to Patrick Garland’s question “What is it

particularly that affects you about die, Irish landscape ?” replied: “If
/
you’re involved with poetry, you’re involved with words, and words

for me seem to have more nervous energy when diey are touching

territory that I know, that I live with.....The words come alive

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and get a kind of personality they’re involved with it.”1

When we consider Heaney’s use of metaphors and similies we

notice that he is trying to work out his own set of similitudes

between the tenor and the vehicle. The main concern in these early

poems appears to be to embody his sensations and perceptions with a

unique use of language, a kind of, ‘transliteration of sense

impressions’.

The poems which represent the Phase have been selected for a

detailed analysis and they share common characteristics- that is, each

poem is a linguistic construct structured by the logic of its own

sound texture, rhymes, assonances, consonances, repetition,

associations, contrasts and such other linguistic motivations. All

these and many more different aspects of these poems will become

evident in the analysis that follows the poems selected to represent

the first Phase.

The following poems selected from four anthologies'

Death of a Naturalist (1966), Door into the Dark (1969),

Wintering Out (1972) and North (1975) written during the first Phase

(1966-1975) and which represent the respective anthologies have

120
been discussed critically* and worked out linguistically in order to

trace Heaney’s development as a poet. The poems selected for

analysis are as follows:

Death ofa Naturalist: 1) Digging 2) Death of a Naturalist

3) Follower

Door into the Dark: l) The Forge 2) Thatcher

3) Requieih for the Croppies

Wintering Out: 1) Anahorish 2) The Tollund Man

North: l) Funeral Rites 2) North

Now let us consider “Digging”.

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 DIGGING
x / /r X x , * '
1. Between my finger and/my thumb
X / / ./ x x /
2. The squat pen rests;} snug asp gun.
/

/ xx / . x x. / /-.x /
3. Under my winnow, a clean rapping sound
' x / / |/ X/-/ */x /
4. When the spade sinks (into/gravelly ground.
A A* /.* /
5. My father, digging. I/look down

/ x / x / x,/ x . / ^ .
6. Till his/straining! rump among the/flowerbeds
1 V . / X I t X I / Xr •/
Bends low, comes up twenty/years away
/ X .x / p / .X /JX /
8. Stooping! in rhythm through potato drills
f X X . / X
Where he was/digging.

A / /
10. The coarse boot nestled on the lug, the shaft .
x / ,**/./ x i / x ,/ x
11. Against|the inside knee was/levered/firmly.
12. He rooted outfall tops,|buried|the bright|edge deep
X / i X / ix /.- x x .X /
13. To scatter newjpotaroes that we picked
; X x / j * x. x /
14. Loving their cool hardiness in lour hands.

/ x .x /
15. By God,|the oldjman could|handleJa spade.
/ ' x /
16. Just like his old man.

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 / V . / A . /• / , / /
17. My grandfatherJcut more turf in /a day
X <.x / x / • /
Than acjy otb|er man onToi
onpr’s bog.
/ x, / x ,X
19. Once I! Jcar
parried Ihim milk in a bottle
f /r
/ * XfX /, /X X
-X ft , p< /
20. Corked sloppily with paper. He straightened up
X / iX X / .X t i x /
21. To drink it, then felljto right away
/ x I* 'f x ' t* ' i* t
22. Nicking and slicing neatjly, heaping; sods
/ X X / rX /.* / iX , /
23. Over his shoulder, gqfing down/and down
X
XX|/ / |/ X
24. For the/good turf./Digging.

X / | / x, X /fx / . x '/ !X . t
25. The coldfsmell ofjpotato mould,/the squelch and slap
X / j* / j * / ;/ X !X /
26. Of sogjgy peat, the curtjcuts of/an edge
/ /| X / |X / iX ) ■
27. Through living rootspwaWen in my head.
X X «/ t |x /1X / i. a x
28. But F ve (no spade to follow men like them.

X / (X /jX /
29. Between my finger and my thumb
. X / / /
30. The squat pen rests.
x f
31. I ’ll dig|with it.

Metrical Structure

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 DIGGING
° P°13 *- I2£ 1^ To (j I 3,6

-=>

To Pg !
The(squa^|eij(tests; snug as a gun.
cv ccvc cvc) cvcc ccvc vc v cvc

3. Under (my) window, a clean rasping sound

vccv /cv cvccv vccvc cvccvc cvcc
To P« 1^ 12-6
4. When/ the(^pad^)sinks into gravelly ground:
cvc / cv ccvc cvcc vccv ccvcvcv ccvcc
To Pg i2.r
(jy/y) father, (cfigging^ 1 look^own)-
CV CVCVC CVCVC / V cvc cvc
! !
Till his strainingJruinp among tlie flowerbeds
cvc cvc cccvcvcfcvcc vcvc cv ccwcvcc

Bends low, comes' up twenty years away

cvcc cvc cvcc vc ccvcv vc vcv
r To Pg 1x5
8. Stooping in rhythm! tlirougli^ota^ drills
CCVCVC VC CVCVC ccv cvcvcv ccvcc
T= % f2-!T/ 1X6
Where he was (figging)-
cv cv cvc cvcvc;

10. The coarse boot nestled on the lug, die shaft

cv cvc cvc cvcvcc vc cv cvc cv cvcc

11. Against the inside knee was levered firmly,

vcvccc cv vccvc cv cvc cvcvc cvccv
To (5-6
12. He rooted out tall tops, buried the bright(edg^}deep -------->
cv cvcvc vc cvc cvcc cvcvc cv ccvc vc cvc

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13. To scatter new(jpotatoes)that we picked -<r
cv ccvcv ccv/cvcvcve cvc cv cvcc

14. Loving their/cool hardness in our hands,

cvcvc cv/evc cvccvc vcw cvccc.

could handle atepadcj

Fh,tfrvvN. I 3
15. By God, the
cv cvc cv vcc cvc cvc cvccc v ccvc

16. Just like his(old man)

cvcc cvc\cvc vcc cvc

17. (M^.grand father could cut morefmmin a day

cv ccvcc cvcv cvc cvccv /cvcvpv cv

18. Tlian any otlier man on Toner’slbog.

cvc vcv ivcv cvc vc cvcvc / cvc

19. Once I 'carried him milk in afbottle

cvc v cvcvc cvc cvcc vc vjcvcc

20. Corked]sloppily with paper. He straightened up

cvcc /ccvcvcvcvc cvcvJ cv cccvcc vc

21. To drink it, then fellt to (fight away

cv ccvcc vc cvc cvc cv/cvc vcv

22. Nicking/and slicing peatly, heaving sods

cvcvc fvcc ccvcvcJcvccv cvcvc cvcc
23. Over his shoulderigoing^ow^and^wn)^- fAjtn**. I
vcv cvci cvccv /cwc cvc vcc cvc

24. For the/good Jigging.

cv cvievc cvc

25. The cold smell of^otat^mould, the squelch and slap

cv cvcc ccvc vc cvcvc cvcc cv ccvcc vcc ccvc
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 G*- 1*4
26. Of soggy peat, the curt cuts of an (£dge)<r
vc cvcv cvc cv cvc cvcc vc vc vc

27. Through living roots awaken in my head,

ccv cvcvccvcc vcvcv vccv cvc

28. But I’ve no(spade) to follow men like them

cvcvc cvccvc cvcvcv cvc cvc cvc
--f^4^2^et^eii)my(Sg^and my (hu^ ^ ^
cvccvc cv cvccvvcc cv cvc

30. The(sqiia$pen)rests. "ST

cv cccvc cvc cvccc

pAoyw ixgyiM-
31. F11 {dig)with it. ■<-
vc cvccvc vc

Syllabic Structure and Lexical Repetition

126

\
 Stanza No. of syllables in each line
1 8 8
II 10 10 8
m 10 9 10 5
IV 10 11 12 10 9
V 10 5
VI 10 10 10 11 9 10 10 6
vn 12 10 10 10
VIII 8* 4 4

Table I

The poem, written in the summer of 1964 opens

Death of a Naturalist published in 1966 in which Heaney has made

an attempt to ‘search for identity’ both for his country and for

himself and defines the role of a poet in a war-torn society which

have been the themes of his poetry. The poeiii also takes its place as

the first poem in Heaney’s Selected Poems (1980), and his

fyew Selected Poems (1990). Heaney indicates its significance in

Preoccupations:

‘Digging’, in fact, was the name of the first poem T wrote

where I thought my feelings had got into words, or to put it more

accurately, where 1 thought my feel had got into words.... I wrote it

in the summer of 1964, almost two years after I had begun to dabble

in verses. This was the first place where I felt I had done more

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than make an arrangement of words: I felt that I had let down a shaft

into real life.2

“It’s a poem about blood, ancestry, roots, growing up and

away and expresses a deeply felt need to reconcile his new identity

as a poet with that of his former boyish self.’ “‘Digging’

t

nevertheless suffers from a too overt intentionality explicitly forcing

the writing-digging connection so that the poet himself has

subsequently acknowledged its weaknesses while still claiming the

validity of the digging metaphor.”4 Because of his farming

background his poetry often reflects a tension between work that is

manual and land-based and that which is intellectual and scholastic.

, t

“The poem strives to minimise change by attempting to marry the

traditional labour of his forefathers with his newly discovered,

vocation, a reconciliation embodied in the image; of the ‘living roots’

which ‘awaken in my head’ ”.5 Its also ‘a symbol of cultural origin to

be treasured and transcended’. During this phase he has also made

attempts to develop sense values in the use of lexis particularly

unexpected collocations of various lexical items and also in the use

of sounds.

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 ‘Digging’. registers, in small compass, many of the themes and

concerns that would dominate his early poetry, in addition to

providing an early glimpse of certain other issues that would surface

as important elements later in his writing. The most striking feature

of this poem is his attempt to use foregrounding at all levels,

particularly the phonetic and lexical. In order to construct a meaning

structure of this poem, it is necessary to give full attention to the

linguistic relationships observed in the poem. Because Heaney

realises “the possibilities of his poetry as an instrument of linguistic

excavation”6 as it is seen in ‘Digging’. Heaney was influenced by

“the alliterative poetics of Old English and early Middle English

Verse”7 besides ‘influence of Germanic consonance and

Anglo-Saxon stress patterns’. The entry into1 the poem, could be

i

through its meaning but that has to be supported by our analysis of

various linguistic items and their organizational patterns observed in

the poem.
*

The phonetic level of the poem consists of sound texture and

rhythm. The sound texture is die result of the organization of sounds

in various patterns. The most common patterns that help us to

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characterise the sound texture are- repetitions of individual sounds

such as vowels and consonants_which could be further spelt out into

recognizable categories like rhymes, half-rhymes, internal rhymes,

assonances, consonances, alliterations, feminine endings, repetition

of dusters, reversal of sound patterns, repetition of complete

meaningful clusters (words), refrains and so on. Rhythm which is the

result of the arrangement of syllables with their stress values coupled

with their metrical values can be analysed in terms of traditional base

and modulations, the placement of pauses, the use of enjambment

and so on.

We have to bear» in mind that all these phenomena operate in

terms of the vicinity of the linguistic items- to one another since it is

the ear that recongnizes these various phenomena within the bounds
*

of auditory memory.

The poem is written in eight chunks of uneven number of

lines. The first chunk is repeated at the end of the poem thereby

giving an impression of circularity of the activity.

Out of 220 words in the poem 165 are monosyllabic words.

This predominence of monosyllabic words suggests the apparent

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simplicity of the poem. On the background of such words in the

poem the foregrounding of polysyllabic words is quite significant.

For example, straining (6), gravelly (4), nestled (10), rasping (3),

levered (11), sloppily (20), nicking (22), slicing (22) are

foregrounded in the poem.

*

The syllabic pattern is more or less regular. The lines vary

from 5-12 syllables. The basic foot is Iambus with a few striking

modulations. For example,

/ *. X / i * x. / / .* /
Under my winnow a/clean rasping sound

In the above line the opening foot is Trochee followed by an

Iambus, a Pyrrhic, a Spondee and the line ends up with an Iambus.

Besides this we notice Spondee modulations in lines 2, 4, 6, 7, 10,

r

12, 14, 15, 16, 17, 20, 24, 28 and 30. Such a dense use of Spondees

gives an effect of gravity or effort to the poem. Other modulating

measures are Trochee and Pyrrhic in die poem. Iambus followed by

Trochee has a see-saw effect rhythmically.

My grandfather cut more turf in a day.

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 The most obvious and striking feature of the poem is its

formal and phonological repetitions. For instance, the poem begins

with a couplet which is repeated at the end of the poem. The lexical

repetition of digging (3), potato (3), spade (3), old man (2), down (2)

in the poem is significant. Such free verbal repetitions present a

simple emotion with force. It may further suggest suppressed

intensity of feeling. An apparent haphazardness in the manner of

repetition as shown above can also suggest spontaneity and

exuberance. In fact this disorderbness is a necessary characteristic of

free repetition such as this.

The end-rhyme of the poem is not uniformally followed.

However a few apt end-rhyming words are linked-up by a slender

semantic thread. For example,

/xu! ' 7<^/ f^l
sound - ground - down

day - away
l«L MJ
Roughly half the number of lines in the poem are end-stopped

ones. Remaining lines are ‘run-on’ lines in which there is a

grammatical overflow from one line to the next. For example, line

no. 5 overflows on to the following four lines

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 I look down ----- =>
^ Till his straining rump among the flowerbeds
Bends low, comes-up twenty years away------>
> Stooping in rhythm through potato drills------>
Where he was digging.
Assonance <occurs in •

Snug gun (2) pen rests (2)

IN IN N l&l
till his (6) in drills (8)
lil ' m tu HI
than man (18) him milk in (19)
/*/ /*/ /'/ m. in
drink it (21) cold mould (25)
/»■/ m inj 1^1
men diem (28)
N N
Plirases like ‘the squelch and slap/Of soggy peat’ alliterate the

harsh intractability of the environment but through that intractability

skill makes its way: It is ‘the curt cuts of an ;edge/Through living

roots’ that echo in the son’s mind. “Heaney has no such skill perhaps

that is why with the technique of words that he lias acquired he

chooses to emphasise force rather than skill, to pick up a pen that is

‘squat’ and to bludgeon out the shape of a durable solid world. It’s a
t

world conveyed much less in a sense or idea than in the sound and

feel of its objective parts. Perhaps that is why ‘Digging’ has no

133
regularity of line or structure. It is not so much felt in toto as
o

hammered together.”
\

Heaney uses the device of alliteration in order to connect the

two words by similarity of sounds so that the reader is made to think

of their possible connections. The examples are as follows:

l^quaT^snug (2) ^pade^sinks (4) ^raveny^^ound (4)

ligging down (5) tall tops (12) buried bright (12)

potatoes^picked (13) hardness hand (14)
^ \ ‘

sloppily straigthened (20) nicking neatly (22)

squelch^slap (25) 6urt~^cuts (26)

•i

Word final consonance appears in the following words:

pen^gun (2) his^ beds(6) straining among(6)

bends^comes^ years (7) boot^shaft (10)

insidejevered (11) bright^out (12) that^picked (13)

god^ old^ could^spade(15) than man (18) it^right(21)

nicking slicing(22) ^cold^mould (25)

The following words illustrate the instance of onomatopoeia

rasping (3) nestled (10) nicking (22) slicing (10)

heaving (10) squelch (25) slap (25) curt (26)

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 It will be seen from the above illustrations that Seamus

Heaney’s sense of soimd is a centrally operating factor in a variety of

*

ways in the poem. He builds the basic, structure of the poem’s

‘orchestration’ of phonological units. His tremedous concern for the

sound texture is quite obvious in this poem as well as in many other

poems written during this phase. In the opening lines “the

consonantal mis-rhyme here perhaps suggests the gap between the

hand, the symbol of family inheritance and the newly acquired

weapon.”9

Between my finger and thumb

The squat pen rests snug as a gun

The poet’s original memory is one of the rhythm of a precise

technique:

The coarse boot nestled on the lug, the shaft

Against the inside knee was levered firmly.

Again we notice another equal rhythm in the following lines:

Nicking and slicing neatly, heaving sods

Over his shoulder, going down and down
For the good turf. Digging.

135
 The following observation of Parker appears to be partly

subjective : “The physical power and assuredness of these diggers is

conveyed by means of vigourous verbs, alliterations enjambed lines

and assertive diction strategically placed at the end of lines.”10 The

poet’s continuing sense of awe is conveyed by means of the

heart-felt exclamation. ‘By God’, the rather stagey colloquial

repetition of the phrase, ‘the old man’, and the proud, but calmly

factual assertion

My grandfather cut more turf in a day

Than any other man in Toner’s bog.

The use of syntax in ‘Digging’ is quite normal, in the sense, it

is in keeping with the poetic tradition. He has used fragmentation in

the following lines:

Line 2. The squat pen rests (which is) snug as a gun.

Line 3. Under my window, (there was) a clean
rasping sound.
Line 5. My father (was) digging.
Line 24. (He was) Digging.

In the above examples bracketed elements are in the deep structure.

Instances of elaboration are used in the lines 6-9, 12-14, 20-24

136
and 25-27. In these examples SVOA is elaborated by extended

embeddings.

We also notice the use of syntactic inversion in the poem

which topicalizes the fronted word/phrase. For example, the opening

lines
(Between my finger and ray thumb]
The squat pen rests; snug as a gun.
Under my window, a clean rasping sound
When the spade sinks into gravelly ground.
*

It will be useful to make a distinction between two kinds of

meaning while considering the lexical items used in the poem. That
t

is the meaning the lexical item denotes on one hand and the meaning

it assumes in the context of use on the other. The poet uses the

following expressions in the poem:

The squat pen rests (line 2)

a clean rasping sound (line 3)
the spade sinks into gravelly ground (line 4)
, His (father’s) straining rump.....comes up twenty
years away (lines 6 & 7)
The coarse boot nestled on the lug (10)
cool hardness (line 14)

137
 heaving sods over his shoulder (line 22-23)
die cold smell (line 25)
The squelch and slap of soggy peat (lino 25-26)
The curl cuts of an edge (line 26)

The poet in above phrases has gone beyond the normal range

of choice which results in collocative clash. The following paradigm

illustrates the point:

Literal squat (animal) rests normal

Animistic
Figurative squat pen rests deviant J
L a clean (shirt) normal -i- toncretive
1
F a clean sound deviant'
L the (ship) sinks normal j- Concretive

F the spade sinks . deviant

L The (birds) nestled on the (tree) ' normal '

l Animistic
1
F The boot nestled on the-lug deviant'
L cool (water) normal -
1- Synacsthctic
F cool hardness deviant')
L heaving (hearts) normal ,
Animistic
F • heaving sods deviant -1
L cold (drink) normal ~ Synaesthetic
I
F cold smell deviant ‘
In the above examples Heaney has a different style of

describing an object belonging to one sense of perception in a

138

>
different sensoury perception. For example, sound is perceived

visually or inanimate object is perceived in animate perception.

Smell is perceived through touch perception. By using such

collocations the poet, it appears, mixes up our perceptions- the sense

of hearing, the sense of sight, the sense of touch and the sense of

smell which otherwise function individually when we perceive the

world around us. But Heaneyis perception of the world is very much

different so far as his sensibility is concerned, in this poem and in

many other poems written during this phase he breaks down the

accepted mode of perception by mixing them up uniquely. The poem

then builds up its own level of surprises. In ‘Digging’, Heaney’s

“feel had got into words” and the poem presents him “as overtly

determining his approach to the relation Of past and present ways of

life”.11

Lexical cohesion occurs in the use of the words- spade,

gravelly ground, digging, flowerbeds, stooping potato drills, coarse

boot, the lug, the shaft buried, potatoes, scatter, picked, spade, turf,

bog, milk, sods, soggy peat- these words are related to the register of

agriculture. Heaney presents “a highly sensuous rendering of his

139
surrouiidiiigs made more concrete by the solidity of his sometimes
*

surprising word choice.”

Heaney has never moved away from conventional poetic,

devices such as simile and metaphor. A simile is an overt

comparison and a metaphor is more concise and immediate because

of the superimposition of the tenor and vehicle whereas the simile is

explicit. In this poem Heaney uses a simile as follows:

The!pen snug as a gun

tenor vehicle

The title ‘Digging’ itself is a significant metaphor. The explicit

meaning of digging is one semantic level and the implicit meaning is

another semantic level. Both the levels are very skillfully juxtaposed

in the poem giving a gradual rise to the intended meaning of the

poem. The poem very naturally moves from implicit to explicit

semantic level. The tone of the poem very slowly changes at the line

no. 25 and the meaning is further clarified by the time we reach the

end of the poem where the meaning of the verb ‘dig’ assumes a very

effective and convincing metaphoric level. Andrew Murphy has

elaborated this metaphor quite aptly in the following words :

140
 “ ‘Digging’ is itself centrally concerned with this issue of

alienation and the need somehow to negotiate the distance between

t

origins and present circumstances. Recalling his writing of

‘Digging’, Heaney remembers, in Preoccupations, the comments of

the adults on neighbouring farms as he made his way to and from

k

school: ‘invariably they ended up with an exhortation to keep

studying because “learning’s easy carried” and “the pen’s lighter

than the spade”. In the poem, ‘learning’ and the privileges to which it

provides access are what separates the speaker from his father. The

speaker sits inside, looking out at his father working beneath his

window. In this sense, we might say that the growing cultural

distance between the two is marked by the physical distance of then-

relative positions inside and outside the house, high at the window,
/ s

low on the ground. Similarly, the shift in the speaker’s class position

(from the difficult circumstances of small farm life to educated

middle class security) is registered in the privileged position

occupied by the speaker, as he has the luxury of being able to sit by

and observe his father labouring outside”.13

In the poem ‘Digging’, Heaney tries to establish a sense of

141
historical continuity: the father is digging now, in the present poem’s

present, shifts easily to his coming up twenty years away/Stooping in

rhythm through potato drills/Wliere he was digging. Heaney links

tills past activity of the father to the work of , his forefathers who

followed the same course in life. ‘By God, the old man could handle

a spade/Just like his old man’.

In his youth, Heaney has had relationship of sorts to this

extended tradition. He remembers his father’s activity of digging and

picking up potatoes twenty years ago:

He rooted out tall tops, buried the bright edge deep

To scatter new potatoes that we picked,
Loving their cool hardness in our hands.

The poet’s appreciation for the feel of the newly exposed

potatoes can be seen in the connectedness between the boy and his

environment. In a similar vein the poet recalls having ‘carried....

milk in a bottle/Corked sloppily with paper’ to his grandfather as he

worked cutting turf ‘on Toner’s bog’. In both these instances, while

the child’s role .is in some sense peripheral to the main activity of

digging, connected with the traditional continuities that it

142
signals. By contrast the father feels entirely disconnected from this

world. As an adult, the poet is expected to take his place in the

labouring line of his father and grandfather, but, instead, he is

compelled to observe: ‘I’ve no spade to follow men like them’.

Heaney concludes his poem by offering an analogy between

the pen and the spade:

Between my finger and my thumb

The squat pen rests;
I’ll dig with it.

Heaney seems to suggest here that the work he undertakes as a

poet can be a kind of ‘labour’ of the same order as the work that has

been undertaken by his forefathers. In this sense the poet can

*

preserve the line of tradition by depicting the traditional world in his

poetry. He cannot dig literally, nevertheless, he can dig

metaphorically unearthing the life of his family and the community

around him while honouring them by placing them in his poetry.

‘Digging’ is “the first of three poems in which Partick Heaney

is a dominant presence. These poems reveal the creative importance

within his early career of the ‘state of negotiation’ between

_ 143
Heaney and his idea of father”.14 From this poem onwards Heaney

articulates a respect for and kinship with those who dig in the earth.

The poem launches straight into a description of his father digging in

the garden outside die window. This scene gives rise to another

twenty years earlier, of the father digging potato drills and then to

another of his grandfather who ‘cut more turf in a day/Than any

other man in Toner’s bog’. In both the cases the activity of digging

brings hidden treasures to the surface the father spades up new

potatoes while die grahdfadier acts his way “down and down’TFor

the good turf. The poet finds that although the rhythm and feel and

smell of digging engulfs his existence, he has “no spade to follow

men like diem”. His only choice tiien “in answer to this cultural and
i

familial imperative is to look to die tool at hainci”15 : ‘Between my

finger and my thumb/Squat pen rests/I’il dig with it’. Heaney

appears to “express a deeply felt need to reconcile his new identity as

■

a poet widi that of his former boyish self.”16

' It will be seen from die above analysis that the proportion of

phonetic and lexical foregrounding in this poem is comparatively

quite high. There is very little foregrounding with regard to rhythm

144
and syntax. The poem begins with Heaney’s poetic stance using the

pen as effectively, as forceably as a gun. In between this

propositional meaning which ends up with a different connotational

meaning of the ‘digging’ in the last stanza. The poet moves up from

the present and gets back to the past , tradition of Irish agriculture

using the figures of his father-and grandfather, and the hard way they

had to follow for maintaining the tradition. The poet at the end of the

poem assumes his current role and expresses his determination of

i ,

maintaining the peace around him in the.warworn society by using

his pen.

In this poem all the senses appear to be working

•i

simultaneously and perceiving things m mixed, multidimensional

manner. The poem ultimately is an experiment in human perception

* « *•

which involves not only working of the senses but also die working
j I (( i •
of the metaphoric invagination all in , terms ofj1 language which also
i‘,

lends its own dimensions to perceptions.'Possibly the rhythm in the

poem changes constantly as the mode of perception keeps on

changing and the rhythm hovers between iambic and the trochaic

measures.

145
 Tlie language of ‘Digging’ introduces Heaney’s dominant

register. We can hear this verbal style at play in the next two last

stanzas of the poem where he writes:

The cold smell of potato mould, the squelch and slap

Of soggy peat, the curt cuts of an edge
Through living roots awaken in my head

. Heaney deploys several verbal effects here to forge an

evocative image of his subject. The precise wielding of language to

evoke a strong sense of the sight and sound of the world being
' ’ i.
r-
described is entirely characteristic of Heaney’s ,poetry and indicates
j

the early influence on Heaney of the Victorian Poet G. M. Hopkins

t i

and Heaney’s contemporary, Ted Hughes. 1

146
 Death of a Naturalist
t / 1# l , / / , X x, X /
All year the flax-fdam festered in the heart

X * ./ x ,/ * I f x ,/ x
Of the |townland; |green and [heavy (headed

t * \/ x 1 / /ix / x / 1 ✓
3. Flax had rotted there, weighted down by huge sods.
/ XfX / X X. X / , x X / •
4. Daily] it swejltered in the punishing sun.

5. Bubbles gargled delidately,/bluebottles

7 x. / / ,X / »X / i x /
6. Wove a (strong gauze) of sound) around the smell.
X X j/xi/’/JX/jX/
7. There were dragontflies, spatted butterflies.

X / ,* ' .x * . / / i/x
8. But best of all|was the warm thick slobber
X / ./ X i / ' i/ X , / X
9. Of frogspawn that grew like clotted water
xx,/ X . X ' / . / x/x ' /
10. In the shade ofjthe banks.) Here, every spring
X y |/ / , / / /T, / x
1L I wouldjfill jampotfulsj of the|jellied

/ X/ X * / X , / x»/
12. Specks to range on windowfsills atjhome,

X / ,X / |X / iX ■/ 1/ X
13. On shelves at school, and wait and watch)until

X ’ /I X x , / / I / Xj / X
14. The fattening (dots burst] into jnimble-
/ X |/ / >X / ,x / |X /
15. Swimming! tadpoles. Miss Walls) would tell) us how
x /, x / ,x / »x / \'
16. The dandy frog was called)a bull/frog
X / .x / ,x / ,x / ?x /
17. And how he croakeq and how)tlie mupimy frog

r /.x x/ ' x »/ x
18. Laid hunklreds of(little pggs and this was

147
 / / ,X X, ,/ X | / * ,X / ,yf
19. Frogspawn. You could tell tliej weather by frogs/too
x * . x /i- X X .X / .x /
20. For they were yellow injthe sunlaud brown
X I
21. Tn rain.

' x |f ' f' ' ,x /

22. Then onejhot dayjwhen fields were rank
X / 1 I X. X •/,*/, x /
23. With cowjdung inlthe gras^f the anjgry frogs
X /. X X . t / x / • / /. /».
24. Invaded the|flax-darnel ducked/through hedges
x x / / i x x ,x x ■ / /
25. To a coarse croaking than I hadlnot heard
x / . x / ix / ,x xi r / |x
26. Before. The airlwas thicklwith aibass chorus.
/ / .x / . / / ,x ' ix /
27. Right down the dam I gross-bellied frogslwere cocked
X / ,x / I X X ‘ / x /
28. On spds; their loose necks pulsed like sails. Some hopped:
X t ,X / fx x ./ / , x /
29. The slapland plopjwere obscene threats/ Some sat
/ x,/ X./ X./ / i X *
30. Poised like mud grenades, theirjblunt heads!farting.
Mix / |X/,x /,/ ./
31. I sickened, turned (and ran.( The greatj slime kings
X /ix x fx / . X x ,x /
32. Were gathered there for vengeance andf I knew
* *j* ' i* ' / ' ,x
33. That ifjI dipped| my hand(the spawn/would clutch it.

Metrical Structure

148
 Death of a Naturalist

1. All year tlie(fla.x-dam) festered in the heart

vc cv cv jccvcc-cvc cvccvc vc cv cvc

2. Of the/townland; green and heavy headed

Tajfjr IS»
vccv cvccvcc ccvc vcc cvcv cvcvc
To
.Flaxjhad rotted there, weighted (gown) Dy iiuge(sods)
ccvc ccvc cvcvc cv cvcvc cvc cv ccvc cvcc

Daily it sweltered in the punishing^un)-

r® e_3 iso

cvcvvcccvccvc vccv cvcvcvc cvc

5. Bubbles gargled delicately, bluebottles

cvccc cvcvcc cvcvcvccv ccvcvccc

6. Wove a strong gauze of sound around the smell,

cvc vcccvc cvc vccvcc vcvcc cv ccvc

7. There were dragon-flies, spotted butterflies,

cv cv ccvcvc-ccvc ccvcvc cvcvccvc
But best of all was the warm(jhiclc) slobber To fg 1S1
8.
cvc cvccvc vccvc cv cvc cvc ccvcv
To^
iso
9. Off(rogspawji)that giew like clotted water
vcccvcccvc cvccccv cvc ccvcvc cvcv

10. In the shade of the banks. Here, every spring

vc cv cvc vc cv cvccc cv vccv cccvc

11. I would fill jampotfuls of the jellied

vcvc cvc cvccvccvcc vc cv cvcvc

12. Specks to range on window-sills at home,

ccvcc cv cvcc vc cvccv-cvcc vq cvc

149
 13. On shelves at school, and wait and watch until
vc cvccc vc ccvc vcc cvc vcc cvc vccvc

14. The fattening dots burst into nimble-

cv cvcvcvc cvcccvcc vccv cvccc

15. Swimming tadpoles. Miss Walls would tell us how

ccvcvc cvccvcc cvc cvcc cvc cvc vccv

16. The dadd; was called a bullfrog

cv cvcv cvc cvcc vcvcccvc

17. And how he croaked and how the mumm;

vcc cv cvccvcc vcccv cv cvcv ccvc

18. Laid hundreds of little eggs and this was

cvc cvcccvcc vc cvcc vcc vcc cvc .cvc
pSun*\ Pa
MS
19. (Trogspawri) You could tell the weather b;
ccvcccvc cv cvc cvc cv cvcv cv ccvcc cv

20. For they were yellow in the(sun) and brown

cv cv cv cvcv vccv cvc vcc ccvc

21. In rain,
vc cvc

22. Then one hot day when fields were rank

cvc cvc cvc cv cvc’ cvccc cv cvcc

23. With cowdung in the grass the angry

cvc cvcvc vccv ccvc cv vcccv ccvcc
J7—---------------------------------------------------- -
fA-ow 14 9
24. Invaded the(flax~dam) I ducked through hedges
vccvcvccv ccvcc-cvc v cvcc ccv cvcvc

25. To a coarse croaking that I had not heard

cv v cvc ccvcvc cvc v cvc cvc cvc
150
 Pj I ^ -9
26. Before. The air was(tkick)with a bass chorus, <r
cvcv cv v cvccvc cvc v cvc cvcvc
pjftciwv Pg fv4jOV*-v fs (S'®
K3 27. Right(down)the dam gross-bellied(froffij) were cocked
cvc cvc cv cvc ccvc-cvcvc ccvcccvcvcc

28. On%?ds) their loose necks pulsed like sails. Some hopped:
vc cvcc cv cvc cvcc cvccc cvccvcc cvc cvcc
k

29. The slap and plop were obscene threats. Some sat
cv ccvc vcc ccvc cv vccvc ccvc cvc cvc

30. Poised like mud grenades, their blunt heads farting,

cvcc cvc cvc ccvcvcc cv ccvccevcc cvcvc

31. I sickened, turned and ran. The great slime kings

c cvccc cvcc vcc cvc cv ccvc ccvc cvccc

32. Were gathered there for vengeance and I knew

cv cvcvc cv cv cvccvcc vccvccv

33. That if 1 dipped my hand the spawn would clutch it.

cvc vc v cvcc cv cvcccv ccvc cvc ccvc vc

Syllabic Structure and Lexical Repetition

151
 Chunk Lines No. of syllables in each line
»

I 10 10 11 11 11
(1) (2) (3) (4) (5)
10 10 10 10 10
(6) (7) ' (8) (9) (10)
10 9 10 10 10
(H) (12) (13) (14) (15)
9 10 - 10 11 10
(16) (17) (18) (19) (20)
2 *

(21)
II 8 10 11 10 11
(22) (23) (24) (25) (26)
10 10 10 10 10
(27) (28) (29) (30) (31)
10 11
(32) (33)

Table No. 2.

This poem was first published in the 1960s and included in his

Selected Poems 1965-75. ‘Death of a Naturalist5 was the title poem

of Heaney’s first book, published in 1966 and was very widely

anthologized through the 1970s.

152
 The poem such as ‘Blackberry Picking’, ‘Churning Day’ and

‘Death of a Naturalist’ display a brilliancy of description. They

convey a sense of the occasion at once with clarity and accuracy.

They are a triumph of evocation. These poems are Heaney’s serious

attempts to recreate, and so clarify, unfalsified and in the strongest

terms possible, a powerful complex of emotions, sensations and

impressions. There is a primitive trust in the force of onomatopoeic

recreation and simple visual imagery to convey an experience or

render the thick, heavy textures of the physical world. His poetry

offers the attractions of sensuous and aural gratification. Heaney,

therefore, is able to give full rein to his remarkable gift of realising,

freshly and rigorously, the physical world. It is, afterall, the focus of

his life as a child

Now let us look at the poem, closely in order to understand the

significance of the foregoing comments. The most striking feature of

this poem is Heaney’s attempt to muse foregrounding at all levels,

particularly, the phonetic and the lexical. The linguistic

foregrounding is so dominant that we just cannot think of building its

semantic structure without giying proper attention to the linguistic

153
relationships. In such a poem we cannot start from a meaning

standpoint at all. The entry into a traditional poem could be through

its meaning, but in the context of the present poem we have first to

concentrate on the linguistic items, their organizational patterns and

then gradually get at the meaning through our responses to the

linguistic items thus observed.

The phonetic level of the poem consists of sound texture and

rhythm. The sound texture is the result of the organization of sounds

in various patterns. The most obvious patterns that help ns

characterise the sound texture are - repetitions of individual sounds

which could be fiuther spelt out into recognizable categories like

rhymes, half-rhymes internal rhymes, consonance, alliteration,

repetition of clusters, reversal of sound patterns, refrain and so on.

Rhythm, which is the result of the arrangement of syllables with their

stress values coupled with their metrical values, can be analysed in

terms of metrical analysis, the placement of pauses and the use of

ejambment. We have to bear in mind that all these phenomena

operate in terms of the vicinity of the linguistic items to one another,

since it is the ear that recognizes these various phenomena within the

154
bounds of auditory memory. The intensiiy of effect is proportional to

the nearness of sounds to one another. We will substantiate this a

little later in the following analysis.

This is a poem of 33 lines divided into two sections of 21 and

12 lines respectively. Although the left margins are justified and the

capital letter convention is followed, die second section begins with

the sort of indentation we associate with a paragraph of prose. The

lines appear to be fairly uniform in length .with the exception of the

final line of the first section which is abrupt, ‘In rain’.

Out of 316 syllables in the poem 208 are monosyllabic words. The

predominance of monosyllabic words suggests the superficial

simplicity of the poem. On the background of such words in the

poem the foregrounding of the polysyllabic words is quite

significant. For instance, words such as flax-dam, festered,

sweltered, bluebottles, dragon-flies, spotted butterflies, slobber,

ffogspawn, jambpotfulls, window-sills, fattening, swimming

tadpoles, croaking, gross-bellied grenades, farting, sickened,

vengeance.

155
 The syllabic pattern is more or less regular. The lines vary

between 11 and 12. The lines are five - foot, the basic foot being

iambus. There are occasional modulations of trochies and spondees

and pyrrhics, for example,

/ / ./> / ./ / l X
'i* x i, '•X
^ 7/
All year the flaxfdam fesjfered in pie heart
X X , > X ,/ * . / >/ , / x
Of the townland; green andj heavy! headed

Line no. 1 opens with a spondee followed by an iambus, again

a spondee and a pyrrhic and ends up with the iambus. The 2nd line

begins with a pyrrhic followed by four trochees successively. As a

matter of fact several lines in the_poem begin with a falling rhythm

and occasionally he begins a few lines with the use of pyrrhic

followed by either a spondee or a trochee. The metrical analysis of

the poem displays such a rich variety of modulations which creates a

wonderful mixture of rhythms.

Another striking feature of the poem is its formal and

phonological repetitions. The repetitions of the lexical items is

predominant in the poem. The following words repeat more than

once in the poem: flax-dam (1, 24), down (3, 27), sods (3, 28), sun

i>

156
(4, 20), thick (8, 26), frogspawn (9, 19), frog (9, 16, 17, 19, 23, 27).

Such free verbal repetitions present a single emotion with force. It

may further suggest suppressed intensity of feeling and apparent

haphazardness in the manner ofTepetition as shown in the figure. It

can also suggest spontaneity and exhuberance. In fact this

disorderliness is a necessary characteristic of this kind of repetition.

Out of 33 lines in the poem 11 are end-stopped in which the

last syllable coincides with an important grammatical break such as

frill stop or comma. But the remaining 22 lines are run-on type in

which there is grammatical overflow from one line to the next. For

example:

1. All year the flax-dam festered in the heart —>

—> 2. Of the townland; green and heavy-headed —>
*

—> 3. Flax had rotted there weighted down by huge sods.

There is a tension between the metrical pause at the end of the

line no.l and syntactic pull of the Prep-P in the second line. This is a

kind of grammatical overlap between all the run - on lines marked in

the figure. This sets up a tension between the expected pattern and

the pattern already existing. In brief, the use of run - on lines is

157
significantly foregrounded in the poem. In all, 9 pauses occur within

the lines and 9 at the end of lines. Heaney breaks some of the lines in

a balanced way. Sometimes the line is punctuated- ‘flax had rotted

there, weighted down by huge sods’. At other times the line has a

natural balance in its phrasing- ‘But best of all was the warm thick

slobber5, where the pause seems to me to come naturally for effect

after the word ‘all’. Most lines run on to complete their clause or

sentence in the following line. This is an effective way of

progressing the narrative drive of the piece.

*

This poem creates an interesting patterns of sounds. In the

opening of the poem Heaney is determined to create the atmosphere

of the flax-dam as vividly as he can. To that he chooses, in the first

ten lines to load his images heavily with words that stretch vowels

and insist on a certain weightiness in their consonance; the flax is

green and heavy headed; it had ‘rotted there, weighted down by huge

sods’. The t and d sounds weigh the images and slow them down. He

chooses ‘weighted’ rather than-the more conventional ‘weighed’ for

the same reason.

158
 The lines

Wove a strong gauge of sound around the smell.

There were dragon-flies, spotted butterflies,
emphasise s and z sounds which evoke the bluebottle and other

winged creatures that fill the air above the dam. “In the last 12 lines

of the first section the alliteration, ‘jampotfull of the jellied’, ‘wait

and watch’ and the repetition of ‘frog’ help create a sense of

innocent wonderment”.17

Internal rhyme occurs in

flax dam(l) sound around (6) frog cocked (27)

fX.1 /JCf fUMf I(LU) f Of lol
Heaney uses the device of alliteration in order to connect the

two words by similarity of sounds so that we are made to think of

their possible connections. For example,

flaxdam festered (1) heavy headed (2)

Sweltered sun (4) bubbles bluebottles (5)

Strong sound smell (6) but best (8)

jampotfuls jellied (11) specks alls (12)

wait watch (13) walls Ivould (15)

frogspwan frog (19) laid little (18)

159
 one when (22) coarse croaking (25)

had heard (25) down dam (27)

sods sails some (28) slap some sat (29)

sickened slime (31)

Word final consonance occurs in the following examples

Townland headed (2) rotted weighed (3) bubbles bluebottles (5)

sound^ around (6) school^ until (13) tadpoles^walls (15)

hundredsjsggs (18) had^ heard(25) bass^ chorus(26)

right^ cocked (27) slap^ plop (29)

sickened turned (31) hand would (33)

It will be seen from the above illustrations that Heaney’s sense

of sound is a centrally operating factor in a variety of ways in the

poem. He builds the basic structure on the basis of die poem’s

“orchestration” of phonological units. “The sheer noise Heaney

manages to make out‘of English vowels here is remarkable- a

dissonant cacophony that forces the mouth to work overtime if the

reader speaks the lines aloud. Language is thus deployed here with

enormous precision in order to evoke a detailed image of a very

|Q
specific world” . Heaney does not seem to show any concern for

160
any syntactic audities in the poem. But his tremendous concern for

the sound texture is quite obvious in this poem as well as in other

poems of this anthology.

The narrative element in this poem carries the reader steadily

through to an ending which will require further thought. The first

section seems to present a scene familiar to childhood learning both

natural and in the controlled context of the classroom, while the

second section seems further on in time and more grown up in its

language and vision. The ‘obscene threat’ and ‘their blunt heads

farting’ immediately strikes us somewhat shocking. The most

important organizing principle is the division of the poem into two

sections. The first section introduces the landscape of the poem, and

in an amusing way, describes the traditional role of the tadpole in

junior schools. The second section picks up the tone of the poem’s

opening lines and confirms the darker aspects of the flaxdam. What

had seemed hopeful and instructive experience of life in microcosm

has turned into a disturbing confrontation with the ugliness of the

‘gross-belled frogs’. ‘The nimble swimming tadpoles’ have become

‘the great slime kings’; the hopeful promise of early life has become

161
an aggressive confrontation with the adult .‘angry frogs’. What we

are presented with by Heaney is an autobiographical memoir of his

early days in school and the predictable gathering of the tadpoles for

the classroom tank. However, the poem in its own terms fulfils our
*

expectations occasioned by the title and we follow them through our

critical reading of the text. There is a sense of exploration at the

beginning of the poem albeit in the heart/Of the townland. The heat

and closeness of the atmosphere ‘a strong gauge of sound around the

smell’, suggests somewhere more exotic. The flax-dam has many of

i

the qualities of the jungle but the spoils of the expedition are

transformed into the safe spectacles of the early stages of the

tadpoles ‘life-cycle ranged’ on window sills at home/On shelves at

school, What happens in the jampots and school fish tanks is a life

and death struggle of cannibolism. The tadpole survives and

flourishes by eating its lessers. The fittest survive. Heaney plays

down this fact. “School teachers use the frogs to introduce a range of

facts from sexuality to weather. The naivety of early childhood and

the controlled way in which teachers and parents work to painlessly

introduce deeper and darker facts about life is well described in the

162
first section of the poem.”19 At the same time, the deliberately naive

‘daddy frog’ and mummy frog’ in a sense prepare the reader for the

inevitability of a movement away from such innocence. We cannot

forget that the poem had opened with a succession of unpleasant

images: ‘festered’, ‘rotted’, ‘sweltered’, ‘the punishing sun’. The

second section quickly and comprehensively destroys that innocence,

which, after all, was distortion of the true nature of things.

Paradoxically the flax-dam is still the same place, approached now

through fields ‘rank/With cowdung’. It is the boy’s perception of the

grown frogs which has changed.

It is in the boy’s imagination that the fear is generated, in a

sense irrationally. Except that the fear and repulsion he feels is not so

much a product of the physical threat to himself, it is more that he is

now confronted by a realization that life is not what it seems that life

is about chance, flux, maturation and transformation. What he

realizes is that the transformation of the frogs is prefiguring the

process which we all inevitably have to endure. “The ‘coarse

/

croaking’ and ‘bass chorus’ is an ironical intimation of the trauma of

an adolescent boy’s voice breaking into manhood.”20 This poem

163
evokes the natural world which our ‘civilized’ lives deal with most

comfortably in a controlled situation. It is specifically concerned

with childhood, the innocence of learning and the inevitability of a

progression into experience. In its theme, it is entirely within the

tradition of English Romanticism. In a sense, Heaney has written a

new one of Blake’s Songs of Innocence and Experience, again, this

incident would not seem out of place in William Wordworth’s long

autobiographical poem; The Prelude.”

While ‘Death of a Naturalist’ is essentially traditional, it does

condense the theme of innocence woving into experience and in its

tone and diction it is clearly contemporary. “In William

Wordworth’s description, in The Prelude, of his guilt at stealing a

rowing boat, in his expression of awe-in the ascent of Snowdon, or of

one of his walks in the Lake District, the poetry is charged with an

emotional energy. Heaney’s poem employs what might be seen as a

more modern detachment.” His tone is blunt, ‘weighted down by

huge Sods’, then ironical. ‘Miss Walls would tell us how/Tlie daddy

frog was called a bull frog,’ and, finally, frightened and

disillusioned, ‘if I dipped my hand the spawn would clutch it’.

164
Nevertheless, the poem works very effectively building up a totally

convincing account if a childhood experience; by employing a range

of prosodic skills to heighten the evocative power of the memory of

the flax-dam and the classroom. It successfully deals with the

excitement, confusion and pain of growing up.

Heaney’s starting point is a Darwinian notion of huge process

and slow evolution, but for the poet what counts are the negotiations

with nature of the imaginative mind as receptor and sensor. His title

thus refers to that process of moving beyond a mechanical, scientific

descriptive view of nature to undertake poetic ‘soundings’. ‘Death of

a Naturalist’ is involved with the relationship between man and

nature, which extends to land, society, nation and self. Heaney’s

continual preoccupation with language indicates the desire to

t
*

discover the means to sound out these relationships and give them an

expression in the poem’s verbal organization. Heaney’s early

»

intuition of the world’s mystery can be seen in the poem. Ultimately

it is in response, to the dark that he finds his poetic career. It is not

surprising that a young poet should begin with childhood. Poems like

‘Blackberry Picking’, ‘Churning Day’ and ‘Death of a Naturalist’ are

165
composed out of a rudimentary language of instinct and sensation

and they are so successful because they are principally intended to be

simply evocation. In his early work the feelings and experience

r

which seek expression are those of childhood, constituted by the

basic emotions of wonderment, fear, guilt and the pain of loss.

The first half of the poem produces an idyllic sense of an early

springtime childhood, enjoyed within a natural order. The closing

lines of die first section, however, signal an impending change, as

they register a shift from the upbeat, positive yellow in the sun to the

dark and ominous ‘brown in rain’- an effect all the more marked by

the fact that ‘In rain’, is set as a single line. In the second section of

the poem, the ffogspawn that has been gathered in section first

comes to maturity and the natural world the speaker has enjoyed is

overrun by adult frogs which repulse him. !I sickened, turned and

ran’. A strong thread of sexual imagery runs through the second

section of the poem as die frogs thicken the air with a ‘bass chorus’

sit cocked on sods, etc. The poem is about the difficult transition

from childhood to adolescence, and the simultaneous fascination and

repulsion of sexual awakenings.

166
 It is the poet’s words, not nature which give colour. So

‘bubbles gargled delicately’ and there were dragonflies and spotted

butterflies green...flax, frogs...yellow...brown’. The poem places

Heaney in relation to an acquired tradition. In so far as Heaney is

defining himself within the poetic tradition at the end of ‘Digging’,

»

he is moving away from the preoccupation with nature that lias been

a property of English writing since Romantics. “It is no business of a

poet to be a naturalist so at first the poem may seem a surreal and

macabre account of childhood fear is perhaps much more a statement

of Heaney’s withdrawal from a concern with nature in itself.”23 This

poem has a certain similarity to W. B. ‘Yeat’s ‘Sailing tot

Byzantium’ where the Irish poet rejects the world of nature. The

center of Heaney’s poetry is always human. The emphasis is on the

- r

boy’s imagination on the shaping of the natural world by increasing

skill and understanding, in the end on the naturalness of man’s

centrality in his chosen environment.

The examples given below illustrate Heaney’s metaphoric use

of language:

167
 v

L The heart of the man

Animistic
F The heart of the townland (1-2)
L People sweltered in the cabin .
Animistic
F flax... .sweltered in the punishing sun
L The child gargled
Humanistic
F bubbles gargled delicately (5)
L The spiders wove a thick net
J- Humanistic
F bluebottles wove a str ong gauze of sound
around the smell (5-6)
L the milk was tliick-
Concretive
F the air was thick with a bass chorus (26)

frogspawn grew like clotted water (9)

Tenor Vehicle
their (frogs) loose necks pulsed like sails (28)
T V
some frog sat poised like mud grenades (29-30)
T V
It will be seen from the foregoing analysis, both linguistic and

critical, how precise use of language evokes the specific world of

Heaney’s childhood creating a confused and troubled picture in

words used. Texture ,and structure are seen as aids to meaning

considering “die relative simplicities of childhood in a language

which is.....unmistakably loud and confident”.24 What we have done

168
in this analysis of the poem under discussion is to strike a balance

between the objective observation of the language structures in

action and partly subjective analysis of a critical type, thereby

lending more objectivity and authenticity to the analysis of the poem,

169
 Follower
X 1 IX / jX X| / /
1. My father worked/with athorse-plough
X A / ,/ /
His shoijlders globecjf like
2. a full /sail strung
X / }X / 1/ A . / /
x
3. ov
Betweenlthe shaftsJand the(furrow
X / ,X / fX
[X X x,
X, X //
4. The homes strained/at his cliaking tongue.

A /1 X X . A ' 1 //
5. An expert. He] would setlthe wing
X /, x / . / / . X /
6. And fit the bright] steel-pointed sock.
x /j/ /.X*/}/ X
7. The sod/rolled over without] breaking.
/ X ./ X X X x /
8. At the] headrigJ with a single pluck.

X / , X / | X f / /
9. Of reins,] the sweating team turned round
* / I / x/x -x /
10. And backJintojthe land. His eye
/ x ix / ./x x.x /
11. Narrowed] and angled at^lie ground,
/ X i* / |X X,/. X
12. Mapping]the furrow exjactly.

X / 1 X Xf X f , / /
13. I stumbled in) his hotynailed wake,
/ x' ) > X j X / |X /
14. Fell sometimes on the poljshed sod;
X / X / IX A]X /
15. Sometimes he rodej me on] his back
t ^ X X|X X|X /
16. Dipping and rispng tojhis plod.

170
 //,/Xj/ / J X f
17. 1 wanted tolgrow upjand plough,
x / j ^ / , / AX /
18. To close one eyejstiffen/my arm.
/ h / Xi ' / | / X
19. All I ever (did was ^follow
•X x . / / , * / '|* /
20. In hislbroad shadow round]the farm.

*X)5W|X '/.X /fX

21. I was] a nuisance, tripping, falling,
t X j- / x jX x /
22. Yapping always.[But today
XX./ /fX X / .1 / x
23. It 1S(lnyfafer who keeps/stumbling
X/ fX X|X X / »x /
24. Beliindjme, and]will not go]away.

Metrical Structure

171
 Follower
Jo Pc)
\13
17 CMy fathgr)worked with a horse-plough
cv cvcv cvcc cvcv cvc ccv

2. (His)shoulders globed like a full sail strung

JVC CVCCVC CCVCC CVC V cvc cvcc ccvc

3. Between) the shafts aiid the furrow,

cvccvc (cv cvcccvcccv cvcv

4. The horses strained at(his) clicking tongue

cv cvcvccccvcc vc Eve ccvcvc cvc

5. An expert. He would set the wing

vc vcccvccv cvc cvc cv cvc

6. And fit the bright steel-pointed sock,

vcc cvccv ccvc ccvc cvccvc cvc

7. The sod rolled over without breaking,

cv cvc cvcc vcv cvcvc ccvcvc

8. At the headrig, with a single pluck,

veev cvccvc cvc vcvcc ccvc
To fs '73

9. Of reins, the sweating team turned round

vc cvcc cv ccvcvc cvc cvcc cvcc

10. And back into the land.(HiJeye

vcc cvc veev cv cvcc cvc v
/

11. Narrowed and angled at the ground,

cvcvc vccvccc veev ccvcc

12. Mapping the furrow exactly,

cvcvc cv cvcv vccvcccv

172
 13. J|^umbleJ)in(M§) bob-nailed wake,
vccvcccc vc crvc'cvc cvcc cvc

14. FelKsometinie^pn the polished sod;

cvc cvccvcci vccv cvcvcc cvc

15. (Sometime^ he rode me on(^)back

CVCCVCC CVCVC CV VC/CVC cvc

16. Dipping and rising to ^l^plod.

cvcvc vcc cvcvc cv cvc ccvc"

17. Q)wanted to grow lip and plough.

v cvccvc cv ccv vc vcc ccv
172.

18. To close one eye, stiffen my arm,

.cv ccvc cvcv ccvcvccv vc

19. AM ever did was follow

vc v vcv cvc cvc cvcv
20.1 ln@) broad shadow round the fann
vc cvc ccvc cvcv cvcc cv cvc

21. (Dwas a nuisance, tripping, falling,

v cvc v ccvcvcc ccvcvc cvcvc

22. Yapping always. But today

cvcvc vccvc cvc cvcv
Mb
\13L-
23. It
vcvccv cvcv cv cvcc ccvcccvc

24. Behind me, and will not go away,

cvcvcc cv vcc cvc cvc cv vcv

Syllabic Structure and Lexical Repetition

173
Stanza No. of syllables in each line

I 8 9 8 9

II 8 8 9 9

HI 8 8 8 8

IV 7 8 8 8

V 8 8 8 8

VI 9 7 9 9

Table No. 3

174
 It is one of the poems chosen from Death of a Naturalist

published in 1966. This poem like ‘Digging’ establishes Heaney’s

troubling self consciousness about the relationship between “roots

and reading, the lived and the learned”25. This was the period when

Heaney was experimenting with language while dealing with a

/

number of themes. The present poem at a deep level makes an effort

to communicate a universal truth such as the inevitability of birth,

growth arid decay. This theme is exemplified in the poem when the

poet describes the son following his father and then, the father

following the son.

The poem is written in 24 flowing lines divided into 6 stanzas

of 4 lines each. The average syllabic length is 8 though occasionally

it is reduced to 7 or increased upto 9. The number of monosyllabic

words is 112 as against 40 polysyllabic words which suggests the

thematic simplicity of the poem.

The poem does not seem to follow any definite end-rhyme

scheme as such. However lines 2 and 4 are linked by a regular rhyme

(strung-tounge), half-rhyme - lines 6 and 8 (sock-pluck), another

regular rhyming lines 9 and 11 (round-ground), lines 14 and 16

175
(sod-plod), lines 18 and 20 (arm-farm), lines 22 and 24 (today-away)

and finally lines 21 and 23 are linked by a half rhyme

(falling-stumbling). From thisrdescription, it will be seen that it is a

half-controlled incantatory poem. Roughly speaking the end rhyme

scheme appears to be abab.

The metrical analysis of the poem reveals that it is written in

tetrametre with a basic measure of iambic, foot (44) and this basic

rising measure is occasionally modulated by anapaests (5), trochees

(18), spondees (8) and pyrrhics (13). The spondee used ill the poem

seems to give an effect of gravity and effort.

Most of the lines in the poem are end-stopped in which the last

syllable coincides with a grammatical break such as a full stop, semi

- colon or no punctuation mark but in lines 2 and 3.

2. His shoulders globed like a full sail strung —^

—> 3. Between the shafts and the furrow

there is a tension between the metrical pause at the end of line

2 and the syntactic pull of line 3. We notice a few more instances of

run-on lines in the poem. For example, line 8 is syntactically pulled

176
by line no. 9,10 by 11,19 by 20, 22 by 23, 24. Such a grammatical

overlap-enj ambment, sets up a kind of tension between the expected

pattern and the pattern already existing. We may say that Heaney has

foregrounded the enjambment in the poem when the norm is

end-stopped line. This has created a conflict.between the metrical

pattern which demands a pause and the grammatical system which

resists one.

The obvious feature of the poem is the formal and

lr

phonological foregrounding. It is quite dominant and we can build

the structure of meaning by giving full attention to the linguistic

relationships in the poem. The poem contains* the repetitions of the

words

my father (2), his (7), furrow (2), sometimes (2), he (4), I (4)

on a formal level. On the phonological level, the actual sounds of

these words are echoed at irregular intervals in the poem which form

a kind of phonological foregrounding.

/

There is a considerable amount of phonological structuring in

the poem, for example, the following lines exihibit alliteration:

/

The word final consonance occurs in the following examples:

expert^ set (5), fit bright (6), sodjrolled (7),

turned round (9), angled^ground (11), stumbled^nailed (13)

dipping rising (16), wanted^jmd (17), one stiffen (18)

broad round (20), tripping falling (21)

Heaney’s use of compounding is seen in the following

examples:

Horse-plough steel pointed sock hob-nailed wake

N N N N + ed N N N +ed (adj) N
L_ l_____ i
LJrr1
M M H M H

The syntactic pattern of a poem reflects cognitive preferences,

a way of seeing the world. It reflects the fundamental principles of

artistic design by which the poet designs his poetic world in order to

get a deeper insight into the poem’s inner form and its aesthetic

centre, we will have to discover the syntactic patterns. In this poem

there isn’t much by way of syntactic foregrounding. By and large the

syntax used in the poem is straightforward. There are quite a few

instances of syntactic fragmentation, for example,

178
 (lie was) Ail expert, (line no 5)

There is one more example of topicalization

At the headrig, with a single pluck

Of reins, the sweating team turned round (lines 8 and 9)

When we consider Heaney’s choice of diction in the poem we

notice words such as horse, plough, shafts, furrow, horse’s clicking

tongue, steel-pointed sock, sod, headrig, pluck, land, ground, farm,

which form lexical cohesion in the poem. The verbs suggesting

motion/movement are as follows:

Worked, globed, strung, strained, set, fit,

turned, narrowed, angled, stumbled, fell,

roll, grow, plough, close, stiffen, follow, go,

sweating, tripping, felling, yapping, rising.

Such a use of words gives us a picturesque description of the farming

activity going on in the poem.

i

Heaney in this poem effects an immediate consonance

between his own unfolding act of poetic composition and Ms father’s

179
work with the plough. Heaney seems to register an equivalence

between the end of the ploughed furrow and die end of poetic line

where the two physically mirror each other in the neat enjambment

...the sweating team turned round-

And that into the land...

Here the turn of the verse itself matches, exactly the turning of the

horses it describes. Elsewhere in the poem Heaney creates similar

effects as in the case of the end-stopped.

The sod rolled over witiiout breaking (line 7)

a line composed of a single sentence, which, just like the unbroken

turned sod it describes, maintains its own integrity (rather than

running on into the next line as in the case of

.....the sweating team turned round/And that into the land...) Again

with ‘a single pluck/Of reins’...occurs a stanza break, reflecting die

momentary drag and stay which pulls the horses round. Considered

in this light ‘Follower’ might appear to be “a perfect formal

enactment of the pledge which Heaney offers at the end of

‘Digging’....synthesizing metaphor and for practice he turns his pen.

here into a ploughshare; he effects a consonance between his poetic

180
labour and the labour of his family and community and in the

process, he memorializes that labour in verse”.

At the end of the poem it is the father-son relationship

reversed which holds the composition together, and the echoes are

no longer the echoes of a set and understood rhythm but of

‘stumbling’.

Before the change began

He would set wing/And fit the bright steel-pointed sock...

11

The lines “are sharp with ks interspaced with duller sounding ds and

gs to give the feel of heaviness of the land, and, in line 5 some

intrusive ns to simulate the teams freer running momentarily at the

head land. Then the son, the little boy, the follower, ‘was a nuisance,

tripping, falling/yapping always’.”27.... ‘But today/it is my father

who keeps stumbling/Behind me, will not go away’. This is a

successful and moving image that transforms the poem and sets the

original control and expertise in its limited past and essentially

f

emotional place. Texture of language has been used effectively for

contrast in the earlier poems but “the use of a concluding image to

‘top up’ die incipient emotion in ‘Follower’ subordinates the textural

181
changes to the overall intention of the poem in a new and effective

manner.”28

The poem is, in a away, transitional “while the picture of the

poet’s father ploughing is put together in the sharp,

metallic - sounding manner that the chink and click of the process

suggest to the ear, die control implicit in this weakens as the poet

depicts his own failure ever to achieve the rhythm intrinsic to this

Tnysteiy’.”29

The above analysis of the poem emphasises die fact that we

are not. supposed to respond to the poem in a linear, logical,

propositional manner. We are expected to look at the poem as a

picture giving attention to the totality of the poem at one glance and

hold together in the consciousness all the connections, and allow our

mind to generate whatever meaning it can.

182
 The Forge
/ x, / . x,x / 1/ X|X /
1. All I/know is/a door/into/the dark.
X ( i * '\* x \f f i / '*
2. Outside,/old axfl.es and/iron hoop^ rusting;
X / . X / | X // X /|/ 1
3. InsideJ the hammered anvil’s shordpitched ring,
X /l}t //■* x. x / , x /
4. The unpredictable jfantail Jof sparks
X / x* x / >/ / f x x. / x
5. Or hiss/when a new/shoe toujghens infwater.
X /xl t IX / ]X x lx / I x
6. The anjvil must) be somewhere in the centre,
f X:J* 3 x / X X
7. Horned ais a un|iHcorn, at one end square,
X. ^1/ X I X X | X X
8. Set there imr
injmove|ble: anjaltar
X x 1 X / iX / 1/ / |X / »x
9. Where hej expends) himself)in shape/and music.
x / I / x | / x i./ xix /
10. Sometimes/ leather+aproned, hairs in/his nose,
X / f XXj/ *j / XI XX
11. He leans out on thejjamb, recalls a flatter
X / I? /LX XI ' x |X /
12. Of hoofs) where traffic is/flashing) m
ir rows;
X / |X / IX X [X / |X /
13. Then grunts] and goes]in, with|a slam/and flick
x/,/ / . / x, / x i/ x
14. To beat real iron/out, to/workthe) bellows.

Metrical Structure

183
 The Forge

1. All I know is a door into the dark,

vc vcv vcv cv vccvcv cvc
T> fa 185
2. Outside, old axles an<Kjro$ hoops rusting;
vccvc vccvccevevce wcevcc cvcevc

3. Inside, the hammerecKjjmvil^ short-pitched ring,

vccvc cv cvcvc /vccvcccvc cvcc cvc

4. Theunpredictable|fantail~of sparks
, cv vcccvcvccvcc/cvcCvc vc ccvcc

5. Or hiss whei/a new shoe toughens in water,

J
v cvc cvc v ccv cv cvcvcc . vc cvcv
6. ThefamS) must be somewhere in the centre,
cv vccvc cvcc cv cvccv vccv cvccv

7. Horned as a unicorn, at one end square,

cvcc vc v cvcvcvc vc cvc vcc ccev

8. Set there immoveable: an altar

cvc cv vcvcvcc vc vccv

9. Whereyp expends himself in shape and music,

cv^cv vcccvccc cvccvcc vc cvc vcc ccvcvc

10. f Sometimes, leather-aproned, hairs in his nose,

\cvccvcc cvcv vccvcc cvc vccvc cvc

11. (h^ leans out on the jamb, recalls a clatter

cv cvcc vc vccv cvcc cvcvcc vccvcv

12. Of hoofs where traffic is flashing in rows;

vc cvcc cv ccvcvc vc ccvcvc vc cvc

184
13. Then grunts and goes in, with a slam and flick
cvc ccvcccvcccvc vccvc vccvcvccccvc
pA<*r*~v

14. To beat real(irori)out, to work the bellows, ■<r

cvcvc cvcwc vc cvcvc cvcvcvc

Syllabic Structure and Lexical Repetition

185
Chunk Lines No. of syllables in each line
I 1 10
2 10.
3 10
4 10
5 li
• 6 11
7 9
8 9
9 11
10 10
11 11 •
12 10
13 1°.
14 10

Table No. 4

486
 The poem is taken from Heaney’s second anthology

Door into (he Dark published in 1969. It is a short poem of 14 lines

without any stanzaic division. The average syllabic length of the line

is of 10 syllables. The monosyllabic words predominate the poem

and make it easily accessible. Polysyllabic words are foregrounded

which highlight the theme of the poem.

On analysing its metrical structure we notice that the basic

pattern is iambic penta-metre with occasional variations of trochees

and spondees which break the monotony of the rhythm wherever

they appear. The following words appear to have been linked by a

semantic thread when they indicate either half-rhyme or full-rhyme

for example:

dark spark rusting ring

/«;/ /«/ Hi in
water altar centre square
/*/ 1*1 ie*l ICd)
The metrical analysis shows how Heaney is skillfully irregular

in his versification. He appears to be irregular both with regard to the

*

metrical line and metrical rhythm within the stanza or the whole

poem. For example, practically every line of the poem has a

modulating rhythm either at the beginning/ the middle or at the end

187
of the poem superimposed on the basic iambic rhythm.

One of the striking features of the poem is its phonological

foregrounding which is more subtle and complex and is compared to

die poems examined earlier. The intricate knitting of sounds is done

on the principle of ‘syllabic autonomy’. According to the principle

each syllable is important and has connections with other syllables

transcending the boimdries of words. Heaney works with the

traditional device of alliteration which works on maintaining the

similarity of sounds in the initial position. For example:

door dark when. water

somewhere center grunts goes

beat bellows

The following examples illustrate consonance created by the

similarity of word ending consonants.

old inside hand

unpredictable fantail homed end

unicorn^ one beat^ out

The following words can be categorised in the categoiy of

onomatopoeia where sound suggests meaning:

188
 hiss clatter grunts slam flick

The use of these words help create a very realistic

atomosphere in the poem by enabling the reader to perceive the

» .

effect by his auditory imagination.

There are two compoundings used in the poem:

Short-pitched ring leather-aproned man

Adj + N + ed N N N + ed N
L—^ I ^
M H M H

Besides the type of compoundings mentioned above, Heaney

uses a number of different word combinations belonging to different

grammatical categories in his laterpoetry.

/

When we look at the lexicon used in the poem we notice a

very tight lexical cohesion. The following words tend to cluster

around a common semantic access to form a certain registeral use of

language:

axles iron hoops rusting hammered anvil ring fantail

sparks hiss shoe toughens water alter shape leather-apron

jamb flick beat bellows

Almost all the lines are end - stopped ones except line nos. 8 and 11

189
 8 Set there immoveable: an altar —>
—-?> 9 Where he expends himself in shape and music—->
-—> 11....recalls a clatter
-—> Of hoops....
In both the cases there is a tension between syntactic pull and

metrical pause, thereby creating enjambment. The poem opens with a

straightforward sentence in the first person which states what the

poet knows about a door leading one into the dark, the title given to

his second anthology of poems published in 1969. The following two

lines are the examples of syntactic inversions where the poet puts the

adverbs of place in the front position in order to highlight the

meaning suggested by the fronted or topicahsed elements of

language. Besides there is a syntactic parallelism between these two

sentences which enhances the contextual meaning. The line no.4

appears to be elliptical in* the sense the implied expression would be

‘there is...!’ or ‘we can see’. The lines 7, 8 and 9 form one long

complex sentence, a good example of topicalization/inversion; for

example:

(Honied as a unicorn)....

(An altar).... music

190
Lilies 10,11 and 12 illustrate another example of a complex sentence

which begins with adverb of time and ends up with die main clause.

The poem appears to have been made up of the three main

elements:, the blacksmith, the anvil and ‘the dark’ itself. The

description in the poem is of two places: outside which is a mess of

bits and pieces, “Old axles and iron hoops rustingf’ and inside the
t

sound of hammer and anvil and “The unpredictable j fantail of sparks

or the hiss of a new shoe as it toughens in water”. Heaney seems to

say that die anvil must be somewhere in die centlre/it is set there
f

immoveable/an altar where he expends himself in shape and music.

Heaney is making the blacksmith a figure of the artist and so of

himself. Occasionally he breaks off from his work to lean on die

door and remember the days when there were lots 0f horses whose

place now has been taken by the cars. We can say in the context of

the poem that Heaney makes the blacksmith perfectiy credible. This

is done by giving little touches which are part of die blacksmith’s

own mind or appearance- “hairs in his nose”, and the way he recalls

a clatter of hoops where traffic isTlashing in rows. Each description

/

plays its part very significantly in the poem, the first to preserve the

191
real and living situation, the other to give that life and extension a

further life in wider ranges of meaning. Heaney possibly wants to

keep hold of both the aspects of life and see them as divisible.

Heaney as an artist really ‘digs’ just as his father did. The blacksmith

described in the poem beats real iron as an artist. Heaney is a digger,

blacksmith an artist. The image of anvil is at the centre of the poem

both physically and metaphorically, that is at the heart of things, the

point of control. It is described as strange and composite object

‘horned as unicorn’, a creature elegant, mysterious and legendary but

real enough in the imagination, and then ‘at one end squared’. Here

‘square’ is the abstract expression of solidity and order, the property

that gives the strength, which makes the anvil immoveable. The anvil

is ‘an altar/Where he expends himself in shape and music’. The

blacksmith appears like a priest in his attire and actions.

As Tamplin observes “Perhaps ‘a door into the dark’ is a real

way in. Afterall, what is outside ? - ‘old axles and iron hoops

rusting’ ”.30 ‘dark’ is not and has not been a negative condition for

Heaney. We can’t replace it by another substitute as ‘interior’.

Murphy while commenting on this poem says, “The speaker in

192
‘The Forge’, seeks to go into the darkness to see what lies beyond, or

within, the outside world. What he finds is indeed something that

‘sets the darkness echoing’- the hammer blows of the blacksmith

working a new horseshoe upon his anvil set at the centre of his

forge.”31

Heaney brings his usual eye for detail to bear on the

blacksmith in the poem as in a few short but evocatively accurate

strokes he provides us with a pen-picture of the blacksmith. “The

ordinariness of this picture comes as something of a surprise and

contrasts with exotic creatures Heaney’s earlier poetic speaker

imagined.”32 As a matter of fact Heaney in this poem sketches an

image of him in his momentary rest from his work recalling ‘a clatter

of hoops.....’. Murphy aptly comments.

“The home having been superseded by the car, the smith is, in

this context a representative of a dying trade. Byt even as he is

presented as ordinary, peripheral, outdated in the poem, the smith is

also centralised, just as his anvil is centered within the forge itself’.33

The blacksmith is a figure for the creative intelligence who is

nevertheless capable of producing from the ordinary something

extraordinary, something wonderous.

193
 Thatcher
X / -|X / l* / -}/ X f/ x.
1. Bespokejfor weeks,| he turned/up somejmormng
/ X i/ XIX x I / x/X /
2. Unexpectedly, his bicycle slung
X x| / t ix x lx / lx /
3. With a [light ladjler and/ a bag Jof knives.
* ./ | x ' | / x i / */ x /
4. He eyed|the old [rigging,/poked at/the eaves,

f X I X / «X JX / I f
5. Opened (and handled sheaves/ of lashed/wheat-straw.
f Y if XI/ / |x x |/ X
6. Next, thejbundled/rods: hapl and/willow
/ / IX / | / XI*/ |X i /
7. Were flicked/for weight, twisted|in case/they’d snap.
X / J* / |X / jx / ix /
8. It seemedlhe spent/the morning warming up:

X / |X /IX / IX / ]/ / .
9. Then fixed/the ladder, laid/out well/honed blades
X / |X / lx ' 1 X / -IX /
10. And snipped at straw/ and sharpened ends/of rods
X / jx/ )/ x| / / f/x
11. That, bentf in two,/made a/white-prongea staple

12. For pinning dowrj his world handful by/handful. J

f X x j / X)/ x// X 1 / X'
13. Couchant for/days onlsods atjfove the/rafters
X / |X / I X / j / //X/
14. He shaved)and flush/bd the butts./stitched altogether

15. Into a|sloped hofiey combj a stutjfele patch,

X 7 IX -/ )X X IX / J /
16. And left/them gaping/at his/Midas/touch.

Metrical Structure
194
 Thatcher

1. Bespoke for weeks,M turned up some morning

cvccvc cv cvcc yfcv cvcc vccvc cvcvc

2. Unexpectedly, unslbicycle slung

vcveccvccvccv/cvc cvcvcc ccvc To P|

With a light(jaddej)and a bag of knives,

cvc vcvc cvc\f vcc v cvc vc cvcc

i eyed the old rigging, poked at the eaves,

!• cv vc cv vcc ivcvc cvcc vccv vcvc

5. Opened and handled sheaves of lashed wheat

vcvcc vcc cvcccvc cvcc vc cvcc cvc cccv

Next, die bunchedfod^t hazel and willow

cvccccv cvcccc cvcc cvcc vcc cvcv

Were flicked for vk twisted in case they’d snap

cv ccvcc cv ccvccvc vc cvc cvc ccvc
8. It seemed^ spent the morning warming up:
vccvcc cv ccvcc cv cvcvc cvcvc vc

9. Then fixed the(jadder| laid out well honed blades

cvc cvccc cv cvcv cvc vc cvc -cvcc ccvcc
10. And snipped at^SS^a^ened^dTof^h7
vcc ccvcc vccccv vcc cvcvcc vccc vccvcc

11. That, bent in two, made a white-pronged staple

cvc cvccvccy cvc vcvc ccvccc ccvcc
12. For pinning down(hi^rworld ^andfa^iy^handfiij)
cv cvcvc cvc cvc cvcc cvcccvc cv cvcccvc

195
i
 13. Couchant for days on sods above the rafters
cvcvcc cv cvc vccvccvcvc cv cvecvcc

&
14. H9 shaved and flushed the butts, stitched all together
cv cvcc vccccvcc cv cvce ccvcc vc cvcvcv

15. Into a sloped honeycomb, a stubble patch,

vccvv ccvcc cvcvcvcc v ccvcc cvc

16. And left them gaping at(jm)Midas touch, 1>s~

vcc cvcc cvc cvcvc vc cvc cvcvc cvc

Syllabic Structure and Lexical Repetition

. 196
 Stanza No. of syllables ip each line
I 10 10 10 10
II 10 10 10 10 :
in 10 10 10 11
IV 11 10 11 10

Table No. 5

In this poem Heaney renders the images of life and landscape of

farming community where he grew up. It is his engagement with

local issues and concerns. This poem follows ‘The Forge’ in

Door into the Dark and charts a very similar sort of trajectory. It’s

about a practitioner of a dying trade, his job being to tend to the

traditional roof work of cottages that are covered in straw or thatch,

an increasing rarity and more rural homes are modeiinized. The tools,

materials and the techniques of this skilled craftsman are

meticulously described in the poem.

This is one of the Door into the Dark poems published in

1969. It is written in-four quatrains, each line being ten - syllabic and

five - foot one. The number of monosyllabic'words is 95 as against

30 polysyllabic words. It is obvious from its syllabic structure and

197
the nature of monosyllabic words that the semantic level of the poem

is quite simple. Besides the poem belongs to the initial period of

Heaney’s creativity as we have already observed in other poems. By

and large, lines 1 and 2 and also 3 and 4 of all tile stanzas are linked

by a halffimperfect rhyme (morning- slung), (kniives-eves). From this

description of the end rhyme scheme used in the poem it will be seen

that it is a half-controlled incantatory poem.

It seems from the metrical analysis that the basic rhythm is

iambic pentametre. The basic rhythm is modulated by a good

number of trochees and by a few pyrrhics and spondees. This falling

rhythm creates a kind of see-saw effect in the poem. Most of the

k

lines in the poem are end-stopped in which the last syllable coincides
' ' . !
i

with a grammatical break such as a full stop, a comma and a colon

but line numbers.2,6,13 and 14 are good examples of run-on lines.

2. Unexpectedly, his bicycle slung -—->

—7' 3. With a light ladder and a bag of knives ■

6. Next, the bundled rods: hazel and willow —-)

—> 7. Were flicked for weight, twisted in case they’d snap.

In these lines there is a tension between the metrical pause at .

198
the end of the line 2 and 3 and the..syntactic pull of the verb ‘slung’

and ‘were’ in the lines 2 and 7 respectively. This is a kind of

i

grammatical overlap which sets up a kind of tension between the

expected pattern and the pattern already existing. Heaney has

foregrounded the enjambment in the poem when the norm is end

stopped line. This has created a conflict between the metrical pattern

which demands a pause and the grammatical system which resists

one.

The poem opens with an instance of syntactic inversion

(begins with an adverbial phrase of manner) and the sentence ends

with the end of the line number 3. Line 4 syntactically overflows into

line 5 where the sentence ends. Line 5, 6 and 7 form the next

syntactic unit. This is followed by another sentence in line no. 8

which ends up with a colon. In fact this is the middle of the poem

and the thatcher is also in the middle of his activity. The next stanza

from line no. 9-12 describes various activities performed

sequentially by the thatcher. The last stanza like the first stanza

begins with syntactic inversion and the sentence rolls on to the last
r

line describing the final activities of the character. We may mention

199
here that there appears to be a sort of circular movement of the work

done by the thatcher, meaning the work is completed as it was

started in an efficient and artistic manner.

The foregrounding of polysyllabic words; like bicycle, ladder,

rigging, bundled, twisted, warming sharpened, wheat-straw,

white-pronged staple, pinning, couchent, rafters] honeycomb, stubble

is significant.

The choice of lexis mentioned above coupled with words like

knives, poked, bag, sheaves, lashed, rods, flick,1 weight, snap, fixed,

layed, honed, straw, sheaved, flushed, buts, stitched, sloped create a

wonderful lexical cohesion suggesting the desired structure of

meaning.

The obvious striking feature of the poeim is its formal and

phonological foregrounding. It is so dominant that we cannot build

the structure of meaning without giving full attention to the linguistic

relationships in the poem. The poem contains the repetitions of the

words

He (4 times), his (3), ladder (2), handful (2)

on a formal level. From the words repeated we can say that (he) the

200
thatcher occupies a central position in the poem and all the activities

he performs move around him.

There is a considerable amount of phondlogical structuring in

the poem. For example lines 3, 8,10 and 15 exhibit alliteration.

light ladder seemed spent ladder laid

i

snipped ^straw slopedT^stubble :

The word final consonance appears in the following examples

eyed old opened "and handled ,

twisted^ theyM morning warning

ends rods days sods rafters

flushed stiched

Assonance occurs in the following examples:

light knives (3) and lashed (5) morning warning (8)

}7Li) /a// /at/ I*} . I°J ' IdJ
The use of the following words is onomatopoeic:

slung flicked snipped flushed

The sounds embodied in these words suggest the meaning.

Compoundings:

Wheat-straw White-pronged staple

N N‘ Adj N+ed N
M H M H
9

201
The above phonological structuring in the poem contributes to the

sonorous sound quality of the poem.

. ‘Thatcher’ takes the ready material of the everyday life and

fashions it something astounding “In a sense we may say that ‘The

Forge’ and ‘Thatcher’ represent Heaney’s own ‘Defence of Poetry’,

his own version of Kavanagh’s ‘Epic’ in which he affirms the power

of poetry to transform, to find in the everyday and the particular

something greater, something more significant.”34 Heaney sees both

figures-blacksmith and thatcher- as artisans Who seek to draw from

their mundane raw material an asthetic form which lies naturally

* ,
within it. “ ‘Thatcher’ can also be read as a submerged poem about
i
]

poets- the poet’s regard for the thatcher is a regard for a laconic,

unfussy skill, for a ‘mystery’ In the old sensed as in Heaney’s

»

regard for the smith of ‘The Forge’, both carry with them the glamour

of the maker which we feel for the young poet anxious to emulate. If

he will dig with his pen, he will also forge, twist, sharpen and stitch.
/

The words twist, sharpen and stitch and also! poked, flicked,

honed, snipped, flushed are concerned with immediate physical and

tangible. Such a use of words lend authenticity to the experience and

202
the vision that Heaney has to record. Heaney is usually haunted by

living things and their textures in Door into the Dark. And the

language he uses is physical and densely packed with what he calls.

“The redemptive quality of the dialect, of gutteral, the illiterate self,

... ”.36 His poetry seems to ask us to believe that “truth is buried

dark, probably frightening, immanent rather than transcendent, and

that when it is discovered it brings something of the smothering

airless underground with it.”37

203
 Requiem for the Croppies
X f \X X( X / t / / j X' / JX
1. Hie poqkets oflour greatcoats full/of barljey-
x / lx x J x / I x / lx /
2. No kitchens on/the runJ no strikjing camp-

3. We movedjquick andjsudden in/our ownjcountry.

X / 1/ *! / / ]XX X 7X /
4. The priest lay befhind dit<Jh<es with) the tramp.
X / /x / J X / J X X JX /
5. A people, hamly marching- onjthe hike-
x / |/ / /X / IX x ./ /
6. We founds new taqtics happening each day:
* / IX X 1X XJX X ]X /
7. We’d cut through reins) and rider with)the pike
X X / 1 f x I fx xy X
8. And stampede /cattle] into in|antry,
X X/|X. /j X X /tx x / \x /
9. Then retreat/through hejuges where cavalry must/be thrown.
/ X x jX /IX / jX /IX X / ,
10. Until, on/Vinegar Hill,(.the fafal conclave.
X/j/X\X/ 1/ X1 / X
11. Terraced thousands died, shaking) scythes at cannon.
X / i / 1 t / * jx x 1 x ;
12. The hill-j side blushed, soaked in/our broken wave.
x MX X j X / j/ X1/X
13. They buried us jwithoutjshroud or /coffin
X X x I x X /| X / |x X JX X /
14. And in Adgus't the baj-ley grevf up out tof the grave.

204
 Requiem for the Croppies
Tb t3 3-0 fi
The pockets of@ great coats full offiarleyY ->

cv cvcvcc vcw ccvccvcc cvcvccvev

2. ^Ng) kitchens on the runs(n6)striking camp-

cv cvcvcc vccv iCVC cv cccvcvc cvcc

3. (Wej moved quick and sudden in(ouj)own country

/cv cvcc cvc vcc cvcc VCW]vc cveccv

The priest lay behind ditches with the tramp,

cv ccvcccv cvcvcc cvcvc cvc cv ccvcc

A people, hardly marching- on the hike

v cvcvc cvccv cvcvc vc cvcvc

)Wg)found new tactics happening each day:

cv cvcc ccv cvccvcc cvcvcvc vc cv

We)d cut through reins and rider with the pike

cvc cvc ccv cvcc vcc cvcv cvc cv cvc

8. And stampede cattle into infantry

vcc ccvccvc cvcc vcevvccveccv

9. Then retreat through hedges where cavalry must be thrown,

cvc cvccvcccv cvcvc cv cvcvccv cvcc cv ccvc

10. Until, on Vinegar Hill, the fetal conclave,

vccvc vc cvcvcv cvc cv cvcvc cvcccvc.

11. Terraced thousands died, shaking scythes at cannon,

cvcvcc cvcvccc cvc cvcvc cvcc vc cvcvc

12. The hillside blushed, soaked in(oui)broken wave,

cv cvccvc ccvcc cvcc vcw ccvcvccvc

205
13. They buried us without shroud or coffin
cv cvcvc vccvcvc ccvc v cvcvc

14. And in August thdffiarley)grew up out of the grave

vcc vc vcvcc cv cvev cccv vc vc vc cv ccvc
*

Syllabic Structure and Lexical Repetition

 Stanza Chunk No. of syllables in each line
I 11 10 11 10 10
(1) (2) (3) (4) (5)
10 10 10 13 12
(6) (7) (8) (9) (10)
11 10 10 13
(11) (12) (13) (14)

Table No. 6

. It is a historical poem which is written deliberately as a

nationalist Irish poem about the insurrection of 1798, which was the

founding of Irish Republicanism. Heaney was very happy that he

wrote this poem in 1966 in Northern Ireland where there was new

slight air of liberalism.

“Fm very glad I did it as a Nationalist minority poet.to use the

poem to stake and imaginative claim for this sensibility. So the poem

did have cultural affiliation, did have political meaning, but did not

have violent implications for the society. It was just saying

i

remember us, take us into account”.38

Twenty years later this poem which is about the act of

rebellion and Croppies being killed and sacrificed and violence, has

207
been read as a code poem in-support of the IRA. Heaney cannot

think of writing such a poem today since it would be a poem of

violence rather than a poem of imagination as Heaney now seems to

be aware of the relationship between lyric and life and the

responsibility that he has to shoulder.

The poem is made of 74 monosyllabic and 37 polysyllabic

words. The dense foregrounding of polysyllabic words creates some

difficulty in getting into the proper theme of the poem without

recourse to its background as stated above. The poem is written in 14

flowing lines of 10 syllables each. There is no stanza division

maintained in the poem. The basic metrical pattern is iambic which

is occasionally modulated by trochees, pyrrhics and spondees

breaking the basic rhythm of the poem.

The end-rhyme scheme is almost regular and the rhyming

words are connected by a semantic link. For example:

barley country camp tramp hike pike

tn /» i ix-i \*i f*<i tvi
day infantry throwiTcanon conclave wave grave
ftfl l<L'l ~ Ml {tif Wl
thrown canon coffin

208
 The poem is rich in phonological- foregrounding. Alliteration

is observed in
kitehen^camp(2) quick country (3) hardly hike(5)

reins "ridder (7) grew~^grave (14)

The following words are linked by consonance:

pockets coats (1) until^ liill^ fatal (10)

thousands scythes (11) blushed soaked (12)

buried shroud (13)

The following words create cohesion and build up the desired

meaning structure in the poem:

Requiem, croppies, priest, ditches, tramp, fatal,

conclave, died, canon, buried, shroud, coffin

These words cohere and form the register of religion. The words

barley, kitchen, camp, country, hedges, hillside, cattle, form another

cohesive group suggesting countryside.

The foregrounding of syntax is worth paying attention to. The

first two lines are verbless clauses which possibly suggest the event

recurring several times. Line no. 5 is also a verbless structure. Line

r

209
no. 10 is without verbless clauses implying the use of missing verbs.

It creates a kind of condensed effect in the poem. Line no. 11

illustrates an instance of syntactic inversion where the word

‘terraced’ is fronted highlighting the adverbial of place. Similarly in

line no. 14 the advt ‘in August’ is fronted highlighting the time when
f

the barley grows.

The only metaphor noticed in the poem is a highly imaginative

piece of language.

L The child blushed scarlet at his stupidity ■>

r Humanizing
F The hillside blushed, soaked in our J

broken wave (12)

What Heaney tries to do in this poem is to effect a sense of

historical continuity between Irish acts of resistance across the

centuries, that is, from the uprising of 1798 to that of 1916.

As Foster rightly puts it, “Political and historical concerns

manifest themselves... in Door into the Dark, notably in ‘Requiem

for the Croppies’, in which all nature, seemingly, sides with the

rebels, who are ultimately overcome by superior and foreign

technology”.39 In this poem, the narrator, the poet’s persona, speaks

210
from beyond the grave and situates them to begin with in an agrarian

context, their pockets filled with barley as they have no time or

facilities for cooking. The poet uses the farm-landscape to advantage

considering the description of the activities -

And stampede cattle into infantry. (8)

Then retreat through hedges where cavalry must be
thrown. (9)

The rebellion of 1798 did not end in victory but in the terrible

slaughter on Vinegar Hill, where

Terraced thousands died, shaking scythes at canon

!
The hillside blushed, soaked in our broken wave.
They burned as without shroud or coffin
And in August the barley grew up out of the grave.1 (11-14)'
f !

Here again, nature conspires with the native Irish, the;hill

*

blushing with the blood of the massacred, the barley a silent witness

to the slaughter. Yet the barley is more than that; it also points to a

harvest of further rebellion, so that battle at Vinegar Hill becomes

the seed of the Easter 1916 uprising and, ultimately, of Irish

independence. We know now, of course, as did Heaney when he

211
published the book in 1969, that those seeds had not all grown to

fullness. Perhaps, however, even he was surprised at how soon a new

harvest would begin.

212
 Anahorish
* / \* / j/ x
1. My ‘place/of clear] water’,
X / I / x|X /
2. the first] hill injthe world
where sprmgs^washed i^(o
3.
f /, x /
4. the shiny grass. •

X / , X x J *
5. and darkened cobjbles
XX / IX x /
6. in the bed/of the lane.

7.
/ Xl/X ,/
AnahjorishJ soft gradient
/ t X

X / ix x j / x i / X
8. of consonant,| vowelpneadow,.

/ x, / x ix /
9. afterjimagepf lamps
/ / j X /
10. swung through the yards
X /. \x x lx. X
11. on win|ter evenings.
X t -x
12. With pails] and baijrows
/ |X

X / 1 / X
13. those mound / dwellers
t f \f x/ /
14. go waist/deep iiymist
x / |x /• j /
15. to break the lighj ice

16. at wellsland dmjghills.

Metrical Structure
213
 Anahorish

1. My ‘place of clear water’,

cv ccvc vcccv cvcv

2. the first hill in the world

cv cvcccvcvccv cvcc

3. where springs washed into

cv ccvcc cvcc vccv

4. the shiny grass,

cv cvcv ccvc
t

5. and darkened cobbles

vcc evevcc cvcvc

6. in the bed of the lane,

vccv cvcvccv cvc

7. Anahorish, soft gradient

vcvcvcvc cvcc ccvcvcc

8. of consonant, vowel-meadow,
vc cvccvcvc cvcvc cvcv

9. after-image of lamps
vccvvcvc vccvcc

10. swung through the yards

ccvc ccv cv cvcc

11. on winter evenings,

vc cvccv vccvcc

12. with pails and barrows

cvc cvcc vcc cvcvc

214
13. those mound dwellers
CYC CYCC CCVCVC

14. go waist-deep in mist

cccvcc cvc vccvcc

15. to break the light ice

cvccve cv cvc vc

16. at wells and dunghills,

vccvcc vcccvccvcc
/

Syllabic Structure and Lexical Repetition

215
 Heaney’s belief that language itself, specifically, the language

of proper naming, carries within itself a kind of native history, can be

seen in the title of this poem, which is the first of the place-name

poems from Wintering Out. The name ‘Anahorish’ is an anglicized

conflation of the native -Irish anach Jhior uisce and

/
Heaney begins his poem with his translation of the Irish :

cMy “place of clear water” ’ The following analysis of the poem will

show how phonetic motivation of Heaney dominant in the earlier

poems still continues to be there in the organization of the poem.

However, it does not seem to be his primary concern now. Another

significant motivation appears to be lexical foregrounding, often in

terms of collocative clashes. I am going to analyse the poem

beginning as usual with the analysis of the phonetic level.

‘Anahorish’ is a .short 16- line poem of four stanzas of four

lines each. The syllabic count reveals an irregular pattern. However,

polysyllabic words are significantly foregrounded.

216
 Stanza Na of syllables in each line
I 6 6 5 4
(1) (2) (3) (4)
n 5 6 7, 8'
(5) (6) (7) (8)
III 6 4 6 5
(9) (10) (11) (12)
IV 4 5 5 5
(13) (14) (15) (16)

Table No. 7

The use of metre in the poem varies kaleidoseopically as it did

k

in the poems so far analysed. In the first stanza line no. I is a

trimetre which begins with two iambuses followed by a trochee

whereas in the second line the trochee is sandwitched between two

iambuses. The third and the fourth lines are in dimetre where in the

third line which begins with ah iambus ends up with a dactyl. Line .4

has two iambuses in succession. The second stanza is again a

mixture of dimetre and trimetre in which line no. 5 has two iambuses

but 6 has two anapaeasts. Line-7 begins with two trochees followed
r

by a spondee and 8 begins with an iambus followed by a pyrrhic and

217
two trochees, this line being a tetrametre. The next two stanzas also

display such a variety both in the use of line length and the metrical

form. The use of iambus and anapaeast creates a solemn purpose

which heightens emotions built up in the poem.

The syntactic frame in which ‘run-on’/’end-stopped’ lines are

used is worth considering. For example, lines 1, 2, 3, 5, 7, 8, 9, 10,

12,13, 14 and 15 are ‘run-on’ lines. The extensive use of such lines

gives the poem the appearance ofrseemingly effect of being closer to

everyday speech. Besides the stanzas appear swift and fluid in their

movement since they are seldom end-stopped.

The obvious sound pattern that characterises the phonetic

texture of the poem are, repetitions of individual phonemes such as

alliteration, assonance and consonance.

Heaney uses alliteration/cross alliteration as in the following

examples:

place clear (1) hill world (2)

Assonance and consonance are noticed in the following examples

which form part of the lyricism in the poem. Assonance:

first world (2) light ice (15)

ld\I \3\j Ib/ /*i/

218
Consonance:

and darkened (5) soft gredient (7)

V______________________ ^ ~ •

pails^barrows (12) tliose^ dwellers (16)

The sounds of this poem reinforce the softness of the sounds in

“Anahorish”. The softer consonants m, n, 1, r and s predominate in

the poem.

Compoundings:

vowel-meadow (8) after-image of-lamps

N + N adv+ N Prep+ N

M H M H

The syntactic pattern of the poem is quite normal. Frequently

it overrides the stanzaic form. Line 1-4 form one complex sentence

without a verb and a clause marker (implied). Lines 5 and 6 are

elliptical, (verb missing) Lines 7-11 form a straightforward complex

sentence. Lines 12-16 illustrate an instance of topicalization where

the sentence begins with a prepositional phrase ‘with pails and

barrows’. Another syntactic feature which is foregrounded is that

almost all the lines begin with small letters-

219
 The poet goes beyond the normal range of collocations in the

following examples:

Anahorish, soft gradient

of consonant, vowel meadow

Heaney considers the constituent parts of Anahorish, and

/

believes that he finds herein phonetic elements of the word and

image of the very landscape to which the name is attached, “as

consonant and vowel combine to reflect the rise and fell of the

land”.40 In the last two stanzas the poem moves from the specific

geographical place to the residues of history. Faintly perceived

human figures enter the scene already established by the first two

stanzas. The place name ‘Anahorish’ triggers the image of light

which the inhabitants carry. However, in the closing lines of the line

they emerge into the light but they are seen obscurely through a mist.

With pails and barrows

those mound-dwellers
go waist deep in mist
to break the light ice
at wells and dunghills

220
What Heaney seems to offer us in the poem is a process whereby

through scrutinizing the particularities of proper names we are able

to understand its meaning, its relationship with the place and its

position of centrality. The reader is made to go beyond the

geographical place in order to catch a glimpse of its human history.

In this poem as well as in ‘Toome’, ‘Fodder’, ‘Broagh’ and ‘The

Tollund Man’ “he rolls the Irish words and place-names round in the

mouth. It is as if he is weighing the language that history has left

with him”.41

Heaney in this poem re-discovers a sense of harmony. The

*
whole poem moves with a joyous energy embodied in its rhythms

expressing a delight in the creativity of water and memory.

221
 The ToUimd Man

A , ,X x / •/
1. Some dajjf I will go/to Aarhus
x /dX / ./ /
2. To seejhis peat-Jbrown head,
X / )/ XX.//
3. The mild/pods, of his/eye-lids,
x ] I x / , /
4. His pointed skin/cap.

•XX / j / X )/ X
5. In the flat/country/nearby
x x / iX /
6. Where they dug/him out,
r I Ax / jX '/
7. His last/gruel of winter seeds
/ X X | / x
8. Caked in hisjstomach,

/ / x // • x
9. Naked except for

J
10. 4e cap noose pd/girdle,
X X I / XI I /
11. I vvilljstand a png time

12. Bridegroonj to thejgoddess,

X , X x / JX X
13. She tigl^ltened her tore/ on him
x / I x x /
14. And opened her fen,
; / |/ x| x x
15. Those darkljuicesj working

16. Him toja saint’slkept body,

222
 ' XJX / i l X
17. Trove ot|the turijcutters,

/ X j / /
19. Now his stained face
x t, x x, r x
20. Repcjses at/Aarhus.

II
couldjrisk blasjphemy,
21.
/ x x |X / »x /
22. Consecrate) the cauldron bog
x /,x / jx /
23,, Our hdly ground/and pray
X X / i / XX
24. Him to make germinate

£ / Jx /, X
25. The scattered, ambushed
/ yj / xx
26. Flesh ofjlabourers,
/x I / /
27. Stockinged/corpses
X /.XX./ /
28. Laid out) in theffarmyards,

' / ,x x /
29. Tell-tale| skin and teeth
/X X / X
30. Flecking the/sleepers
x / </ / j‘x /
31. Of four/young brothers, trailed
x / ,x / , x /
32. For miles along/the lines.

223
 Ill
/ X Xj* / ,/ X
33. Something of/his sad/freedom
* x 1/ x // x
34. As he? rode th^ tumbril
X / I* X 1 ' X
35. Should comqf to me,/driving,
t X xX / x
36. Saying their/names

X x x
37. Tollund,)Grauballe,|Nebelgard,
' x »x / iX /
38. Watching the pointing hands
39. Of country people,
X / | ^ / . /
40. Not knowing them tongue.

x / IX / fX
41. Out there| i» Jutland
XX/./ / rx xK X
42. In the oicf man-kil|ing parishes
x x ,/ /
43. I wily feel lost,.
' x xix x /
44. Unhappy and at home.

Metrical Structure

224
The Tolliind Man

225
 12. Bridegroom to the goddess,
ccvcccvc cv cv cvcvc

13. She tightened her tore on him

cv cvcvcc cv cvc vc cvc

14. And opened her fen,

vcc vcvcc cv cvc

15. Those dark juices working

cvc cvc cvcvc cvcvc

16. Him to a saint’s kept body,

cvc cvvcvccc cvcccvcv

17. Trove of the turfeutters

ccvc vc cv evccvcvc

18. Honeycombed workings,

cvcvcvccc cvcvccc
P* P5 2 3-5“
19. Now^his) stained face
cvc cvc ccvcc cvc
fg 0-1-5"
20. Reposes at (Aarhus?)*
K-
cvcvcvc vc veve
*
II
fjJ
2.0-5' 21. ©couldrisk .blasphemy,
v cvc cvcc ccvcvcv

22. Consecrate the cauldron bog

cvccvccvc cv cvcccvc cvc

23. Our holy ground and pray

w cvcv ccvcc vccccv

226
24. Him to make germinate
cvc cv cvc evcvcve

25. The scattered, ambushed

cv ccvcvc vcccvcc

26. Flesh of labourers,

ccvc vccvcvcvc

27. Stockinged corpses

ccvcvcyc cvccvc

28. Laid out in the farmyards,

cvc vc vccv cvccvcc

29. Tell-tale skin and teeth-

f

cvc cvc ccvc vcc cvc

30. Flecking the sleepers

ccvcvc cv ccvcvc

31. Of four young brothers, trailed

vc cv cvc ccvcvcc ccvcc

32. For miles along the lines,

cv cvcvc vcvc cv cvcvc

III
pAtfv—- P^. 2.X 13-6
33. Something of^ng) sad freedom
cvccvc vc cvc cvc ccvcvc

34. As he rode the tumbril

vc cvcvc cv cvcecvc

35. Should come to me, driving,

cvc cvc cv cv ccvcv

227
 36. Saying the names
cvc cv cvcvc

37. Tollund, Grauballe, Nebelgard,

cvcvcc ccvcvc cvcvccvcc

3 8. Watching the pointing hands

cvcvc cv cvccvc cvccc

39. Of country people,

vccvcccv cvcv

40. Not knowing their tongue,

cvc cvcvc cv cvccv

41. Out there in Jutland

vc cv vcccvccvcc

42. In the old man-killing parishes

vc cv vcc cvc cvcv cvcvcvc
O.i-5 *

2.1.6
43. & will feel lost,
cvc cvc cvcc

44. Unhappy and at home,

vccvcv vcc vc cvc .

Syllabic Structure and Lexical Repetition

228
 Heaney’s first extended attempt at conflating his sense of

Glob’s Jutland rituals with his own sense of mythic and modem Irish
f

history is seen in ‘The Tollund man’, the poem from Wintering Out.

The Tollund man is one of the recovered bodies featured by Glob in

his book: He was a victim sacrificed to Nerthus, in the hope of

securing a good crop in the land. It is in this sense he is, as Heaney

describes him, ‘Bridegroom to the goddess’. Heaney imagines the

killing of the Tollund man and his subsequent burial in the bog as a

kind of violent love making between victims and goddess.

In a characteristically Heaneyan poem such as this there is a

good deal of incomprehensible and suggestive use of language

around the clearly located nuclei. In this poem like in Romantic

poetry the unstable elements predominate. I am therefore going to

*

consider the poem in the light of as many lingusitic dimensions as

possible and. work out its surface and deep structures of meaning.

The striking feature of this poem is Heaney’s attempt to use

foregrounding at all levels, particularly the phonetic and lexical. It is

necessary to give due attention to the linguistic relationships used in

the |3oem.

229
 The poem is written in 44 short lines of uneven syllabic length

varying from 4-9 syllables in each line. The number of monosyllabic

words is 129 as against 44 polysyllabic words. The poem is divided

into three movements each containing different number of stanzas of

four lines each. The syllabic pattern of the poem is as follows:

230
 Stanzas No. of syllables in each line
Parti I 8 6 7 5
(1) (2) (3) (4)
II 7 5 7 5
(5) (6) (7) (8)
in 5 6 6 6
* (9) (10) (11) (12)
IV 7 5 6-7
(13) (14) (15) (16)
V 6 5 4,6
(17) (18) (19) (20)
Part II VI 6 7 6 6
(21) (22) (23) (24)
vn 5 5 4 6
(25) (26) (27) (28)
VIII 5 5 6~ .7
(29)- (30) (31) (33)
Partlll IX 6 6 4 8
(34) (35) (36) (37)
X 6 5-5 5
(38) (39) (40) (41)
XT 9 4 6
(42) (43) (44)

Table No. 8

231
 The metrical analysis of the poem shows how Heaney is

skillfully irregular in his versification. He seems to be quite irregular

both with regard to the metrical line and rhythm within the stanza or

within the whole poem. The basic foot appears to be iambus which is

contradicted by trochaic rhythm, together creating a see-saw effect.

t

The poem begins with an iambic foot followed by an anapaest and

another iambus creating a rising movement. Later we notice the

rhythm modulated by dactyl, pyrrhics and spondees throughout the

poem. The poem is a mixture of lines of trimetre and dimetre which

adds to the total metrical make-up of the poem.

Most of the lines in the poem are run-on type which create the

effect of swiftness in the poem. Lines 1-4 form a straightforward

sentence. Lines 5-11 begin with advp ends up with a main clause.

It’s an instance of syntactic inversion. Lines 12-18 form a complex

sentence which illustrates another instance of syntactic inversion and

finally lines 41-44 begin with a clause topicalized followed by a

main clause in line 43. The syntactic foregrounding of this kind

highlights the contextual meaning. The poet uses capital letters in the

beginning of every line irrespect of the feet that often the use of

232
capitalization does not coincide with the beginning of a sentence.

The poem is narrated in the first person, the poet’s persona and the
t

pronoun I recurs again and again emphasizing the feelings or the

\

expectations of the “I” in a given situation. For example:

I will go Aarhus to see.... (line 1-2)

I will stand a long time.... (11)
I could risk blasphemy.... (21)
I will feel lost.... (43)

' The examples mentioned above create a kind of paradigmatic,

syntactic parallelism in the poem, which seems to intensify the

poet’s feelings.

The phonological structuring of the poem as illustrated below

i

enhances the rhythm and sound quality of the poem.

The following words are linked by cross alliteration:

tollund grauballe Nebelgard (37)

His head (2) tightened tore (13)

trove turf-cutters (17) concecrate couldron(22)

something sad (33) will feel lost (44)

tell tad~^teeth (29) miles~alonglines (32)

233
 Consonance connects the following words:

pods his lids (3) ground^and (23)

his seeds (7) those juices (15)

watching pointing (38)

Assonance appears in

his lids (3) his skin

• //■/ HI (if HI
stained face (19)
fuf fei I
Compoundings'.

Man-killing parishes peat-brown eye-lids tell-tale skin

(42) (2) (3) (29) '

N V + ing N N adj. N N adj. N

l_____ J 1____ J i___ i v~ 1
M H M M M H

When the Tollund Man is dug up many centuries later the turf

cutter discovers

His last gruel of winter seeds

Caked in his stomach (line 7,8)

as a sacrificial victim to the goddess of germination he carries the

potential of germination within himself “in the manner of the young

fighter in ‘Requiem For the Croppies’ whose ‘graves began to sprout

234
with young barley, growing up from barley com which [they] had

carried in their pockets to eat while on the march’.”42 In the second

section of the poem Heaney makes the connection between Jutland

and Ireland explicit. If Jutland has had its victims so also has

Heaney’s own native place and in Ireland to the killings have a

certain ritualistic dimension to them. Heaney remembers an incident

in which the bodies of four young Catholics murdered by militants

were dragged along a railway line in an act of mutilation:

Tell-tale skin and teeth

Flecking the sleepers
Of four young brothers, trailed
For miles along the lines (29-32)

Heaney imagines that if lie addresses a prayer to The Tollund Man as

a Christian then. perhaps the potential for germination and

regeneration inherent in the Tollund Man sacrifice, and in his very

body might be released not in the victims native ancient Jutland, but

in contemporary Ireland.

In the final section of the poem Heaney imagines paying a

visit to a museum in Aarhus where the Tollund Man has been placed

235
on display. Though the name of the region he passes through will be

alien to him and the local language unintelligible he imagines that as

an Irishman burdened with the weight of his country’s history, he

will feel a kinship with a landscape that has witnessed similar

conflict and killings. The closing stanza of the poem is precisely

balanced:

Out there in Jutland

In the old man-killing parishes
I will feel lost,
Unhappy and at home.
Heaney in 1969 came across P. V. Glob’s The Bog People

which was an archaeological study of Iron age Jutland. He says,

“The minute I saw the photograph (of the Tollimd Man) the reviews

I sent for it.” This book covered the deepest concerns of

Heaney- landscape, religion, sexuality, violence, history and myth,

which wouid occupy him in his next two volumes. The book

provided a historical perspective which enabled him “to cope with

and confront the contemporary ‘Troubles’ and created a sense of

continuity, kinship, affirmation, at a time of social and political

disintegration. The Tollund Man seemed to me like an ancestor

236
t
almost, one of my old uncles, one of those mustached archaic feces

you used to meet all over die Irish countryside”.43 Heaney’s empathy

for these ancient victims of tribal superstition and ignorance acquired

a religious intensity.

Something of his sad freedom

As he rode the tumbrel
Should come to me, driving (33-35)

Sombre rhythms and sounds anticipate the meeting of the dispirited

son with his adopted father. Each of the first three lines is weighted

with a trochee-freedom, tumbrel, driving- and the alliteration,

assonance, internal rhyme and near rhyme (sad rode) create their

own burden. The Tollund Man may have travelled on his last journey

in a highly ornate wagon sacred to the goddess Nerthus, but Heaney

*

chooses the word ‘tumbrel’ for the vehicle, a choice which has the

effect of bridging time.

“The writing of the Tollund Man constituted a major epiphany

for the poet, a ‘coming up into the light”44 The part one of

Wintering Out shows Heaney’s increasing confidence with a larger

canvas, his ability to handle the national theme maturely and

237
responsibly. “Places, crisis, personalities and sometimes seemingly

minor phenomena from the outer world he ‘interiorises’, absorbing

them into the inner world”.4S

‘The Tollund Man’ is the most accomplished poem from

*

Heaney’s efforts during the early 70s for images and symbols

suitable for the predicament of Ireland. The poem is a powerful

combination of historical analogy, myth and poet’s intense emotion

which exhibits the depth of Heaney’s religious nature. He treates it

as an offering in which he communicates his perception not only of

i

the pastness of the past but of its present. He composes it from a

sense of reverence for a victim from the distant past which comes

more easily to him than responding to the immediate horror of the

present

Heaney experienced a sort of ‘entrancement’ when he looked

for the first time at photographs of the Tollund Man which matched

that of Prof. Glob, the. distinguished Danish archaeologist summoned

one May evening in 1950 to Bjaeldskov Dal in central Jutland to

inspect a body discovered a few hours earlier by two men digging

peat for their winter fires. In The Bog People the professor describes

238
the shock of finding himself “face to face with an Iron Age man,

who twenty millenia before had been deposited in the bog as a

sacrifice to the powers that rule men’s destinies”.46 Chief amongst

these powers was the fertility goddess Nerthus, a North European

equivalent of the Mediterranean earth goddess Ishtar and Aphrodite.

It was for her sake that The Tollund Man endured his death by

hanging so that the “great ritual drama” of the seasons might

i

continue. Heaney recognized the poetic potential of Glob’s book and

utilised its anthropological insights in interpreting the present state of

Ireland. Heaney’s imagination was certainly accelerated by Glob’s

evocative and poetic prose. Heaney’s poem opens quietly like Glob’s

initial description. The language is simple. Monosyllables

predominate as we have already seen in the first line where the poet

resolves to visit the shrine. No vowel or consonant is repeated as if

music should be retained solely for the young victims. Subsequently

in the quatrain a simple pattern of sounds /s/, /p/, /d/, /ai/ - emerges

and a spare and subtle imagery appears. The reference to the ‘mild

pods of his eye-lids’ established the gentleness of the face, and

connects an adjective frequently associated with Christ and a noun

239
introducing the fertility motive. The image of the ‘winter seeds’

(line 7) in verse 2 consolidate this idea, but this time a starker,

bleaker note has been sounded partly by means of the diction- flat,

dug, gruel, caked- partly through the use of alliteration (the harsh

stops ‘c’, ‘k’, ‘g’ and die fricative ‘s’). “Empathy increases with the

disclosure that he is to all intents and purposes, naked, a fact which

stresses his defencelessness and prepares us for his ambiguous role

as groom/victim. The unequal marriage between the mortal

‘bridegroom’ and the goddess proves to be a durable one despite the

i
»

contradictions and contrariness of Nerthus. She constricts and

t

releases (tightened and opened) is verb and power but has a soft spot

for her man and for the creative process.'(Lines 15-16) Swift and

deadly in her embrace as the alliterated *t* suggests, she is generous

in her choice of wedding gift, constant with he sexual favours. Her

tore, the plaited noose turns out to be “the pass which carries him

over threshold of death”, and her ‘dark juices’ confer immortality.”47

Part one of .the poem ends, as it began, ‘pianissimo9. This

effect is achieved by the succession of z and s sounds. The strategic

placing of ‘reposes’ at the heart of the final couplet, and its near

240
rhyming with Aarhus. Heaney’s ‘Tollund Man’ seems at this stage a
v

modest unassuming saint in comparison to the magnetic transcendent

figure Glob depicts. For the archaeologist ‘The Tollund Man’

embodies the triumph of nature over art. For the poet however, he is

potentially an active spiritual entity, capable of restoring sanctity,

forgiveness and reconciliation to the now unholy ground of Ireland.

i

Consequently in the dramatic opening to Part Two Heaney

contemplates an appeal to the Tollund Man to intercede for Ireland.

He hesitates over the propriety~of such an action which would set

r

him at odds with his own faith and in effect elevate the anonymous

pagan to the communion of saints. Perhaps the risk is worth taking,

however, if the destructive passions in the ‘cauldron bog’ can be

purged away, and a fertile unity might be re-established. In contrast

to the almost ‘civilised’ ritual killing of ancient Jutland, which at

least could claim the dignity of a religious purpose, he cites an

incident from the 1920s as an illustration of the barbarity to which

the some of the ‘Christian’ inhabitants of the island have sunk in the

service of Kathleen and Carson. “Part of the folk-lore of where

I grew up”, concerns four Catholic brothers “massacred by Protestant

241
paramilitaries”. Their bodies “had been trailed along the railway
r

lines, over the sleepers as a kind of mutilation”. An entire generation

from one family- or at best a major part of it- had been wiped out.

Whereas the Tollund Man was forewarned of his death, perhaps

accepted its justification, and was left physically intact by his

‘executors’, the young brothers were ‘ambushed’, slaughtered for no

conceivable ‘common good’, their bodies broken and shredded. It is

as if only fragments of what were human beings remain to disclose

their fate and indict their murderer. Pathos tinges the horror when
* '

Heaney draws attention to the ‘Stockinged corpses’, an image which

makes them appear even younger. Following the almost serene,

painless demise of the Iron Age man, the sadism and brutality

surrounding contemporary killing is all the more appealling.

In the course of recreating the scene at Aarhus and at the edge

of the fen, the poet has increasingly become bonded to his subject,

moved by the ‘stillness’ of history. His imagination eagerly seizes

affinities and ironies and though conscious that a huge distance of

time and vast difference in destiny separate him from the Tollund

Man. Heaney nevertheless perseveres with the bold comparison.

242
 The three parts of the poem itself might be labelled as

evocation (line no. 2-3),‘ invocation (line no. 21-24, 25-26), and

vocation (line no. 33-35). If nothing else, the Tollund Man certainly

germinated North. In ‘The Tollund Man5 Heaney abandons both

straight history and the dramatic monologue. “He opens his proper

door into ‘the matter of Ireland5, by imagining history as an

experience rather than a chain of events, by dramatising his own

imaginative experience of history, by discovering within his

home-ground a myth that fits the inconclusiveness both of memory

and of Irish history, and by fusing the psychic self searching of poet

and nation55.48

The prototype developed by ‘The Tollund Man5 is a

scapegoat, privileged victim and ultimately Christ-surrogate, whose

death and bizarre resurrection might redeem, or symbolise

redemption for,

The scattered, ambushed

Flesh of labourers,
Stockinged corpses
Laid out in the farmyards.... (25-28)

243
Here Heaney alludes particularly to Catholic victims of sectarian

murder in the nineteen-twenties. His comment to James Randall

interprets the amont of family as well as religious feeling in the

poem.

244
 Funeral Rites

I
* / / X X] / xt/ x
1. I shouldered a/kind ofpanhood
/• X IX *1 / * , / X
2. Stepping in to/lift the (coffins
x / JX / |X
3. Of deadlrelatipns.
x % / ,t k
4. They had been laid out

x / ,x /
5. in tainted rooms,
their eyelids glistening. *
6.
x / . / /
7. their douglwwhite hands
/ y ix /ix if /
8. shackle^ in rosary beads.

* / // x
9. Their puffecy knuckles
x /j / y jx /
10. had umvrmkled/ the nails
x darkened,
were 1 /x the
x wrists
f
11.
X //X X /
12. obediently sloped.

x / , / /
13. The dulsefbrown shroud,
* / X / x /
14. The quilted satin cribs:
x /
15. Iknel ^courteously
X. '-l/' C
16. admipig it all
.245
 x / i / X < / x I / x i / x
17. as wax pelted Idown andjveined thelcandles,
X f /X / / X
18. and veinecy the candles,
x / / x x
19. the flamesihovering
20. XX)/ X 4 f X X
to th^womenjhovering

21. behind |lme.

X /I X XfX / IX
22. And always, in/a coper,

23. the coffin lid,

X / , r t
24. its nailf-heads dressed

X / X / x /x
25. with little gleaming crosses.

26. Dear soapstone masks,

/ x|* 'fx , /
27. kissing their igloo brows
X X)X i
28. had to/suffice.

X / /
29. before the nails) were sunk
xx' . / X
30. and the blacklglacier
X / , / * x
31. of each funeral
/ .X I
32. pushed/away.

246
 11
' x ,/ / .X
33. Now as /news comes in

x / I* / 1* *1?
35. we pindfor cerpmony,

36. custojnary jrhythms:

37.
X * / |X t Ix /
38. of a college, winning past
/ / ^ /
39. each blinded home.
* A IX /
40. I would/restore

x / . / X Xj r x
41. die great)chamber of/Boyne

farej aa sepulchre
42. prepare se
/ X IX Hi/ /
43. under the cupparked stones,

.44. out offside-streetsj and bye-roads

' * , / X.X /
45. pumng/fam|ly cars

46. nose l‘ijto line.

/X / | / x //
47. the whole) country/tunes
X X , / X . / /
48. to the/muffled drumming

247
 /*/,/* fr x
49. of ten thousandjengines.
50. Sonm^mfiilantfwomen,
f Xi / f
51. left behind, move

52. throughjemptied^titchens

x /rxx.x x i/ /
53. imagining our plow triumph
x / |X /
54. towards the mounds.
' * Xi t x
55. Quiet as a/serpent
xx / »* / .|X /
56. in its grassy boipevard

X x / j x / Ix /
57. die procession drag^S its tail
/ x x | / X'iX /
58. out of the]Gap of Jrhe North
XX /. j/ X x» /
59. as its head^already fenl
nters
x Xf f x xj / x
60. the megahthic (doorway.

Ill
61. when thejj ifave put|stone
/ x, x /
62. back in its mouth
X X | / ( JX /
63. we willldrive north again
64. past Strang and Cabling fjords

248
 X / »* / 1* *
65.' the cudlof mejnory
* / ]X / I * XI' X
66. allayed for once) arbitration
67. of thejfeud pla^ate^
X /1X X / I /XX/
68. imagining those)under the hill

x / ,x / x
69. dispose^like Guimar
70. who lay|beautiful
X / .X / r X /
71. inside) his bujrial mound,
X / (X t iX
72. though deal) by violence

73 and uijkvenged.
/ / / x | x / , x
74, Men said pat lie was chanting
/x
75. versesjaboutjhl onour
;
76. and that fourjlights burned

x / IX X{X / 1/
in coiupers ofpe chamber:
X t I x 1 | xx/
78. which opened then) as he turned
x x 1 I* /
79. with a joyfiil face
X ^ iX x /
80. , to look?at the moon.

Metrical Structure

249
 I
To Pg
2-51
2-53
1. hshouldered a kind* of manhood
v cvccvc v cvcc vc cvccvc

2. Stepping in to lift the(coffi^)------------------- j

ccvcvc vccvcvcccv cvcvcc
fo %5S~ ______ ^
3. Of^deadjrelations.
vc cvc cvcvcvcc

4. They had been laid out

cv cvc cvc cvcvc

in tainted rooms,
vc cvccvc cvcc

6. (their)eyelids glistening, -To Pg 2-5 2-

->
cv vcvcc ccvcvcvc

Then) do ugh-white hands

cv cv cvc cvcc

shackled in rosary beads,

cvccc vc cvcvcv cvcc

9. yTheip puffed knuckles

cv cvcc cvccc
10. had unwrinkled, thetnads)—T° ^
cv vccvcccc cv cvcc

11. were darkened, the wrists

cv cvcvcc cv cvccc

12. obediently sloped. *

vcvcvcccv ccvcc

250
13. The dulse-brown shroud,
cv cvcc ccvc ccvc

14. The quilted satin cribs:

cv cvccvc cvcvc ccvcc

15. ($) knelt courteously pAflWv fj 2.5*0

vcvcc cvcvccv

16. admiring it all

vccvcvc vc vc

17. as wax melted down

vc cvc cvccvc cvc

18. and veined the candles,

vcccvcc cv cvcecc

19. the flames(hovering]

cv ccvcc eves
To ?3 a-53
20. to the($yomei| hovering
cvcv cvcvc cvCvcVc'

21. behind me.

cvcvcc cv
"To 2.5*6
22. And always, in a(^omej------- *■
vcc veeve vcvcvcv
fa 2So
23. thetcqffin) lid,
cv cvcvc cvc
its fnai^heads dressed,
24. $--------------- ---------
vcc cvc cvcc ccvcc

25. with little gleaming crosses,

cvc cvcc ccvcve ccvcvc
251
26. Dear soapstone masks,
cv cvcccvc cvccc
kissing^e^ igfoo brows *2~ 5 O
27.
cvcvc cv vccv ccvc

28. had to suffice

cvc cv cvcvc
a. so
29. before the(nails)were sunk
cvcv cv cvcccv cvcc

30. and the black glacier

vcc cv ccvc ccvev

31. of each funeral

vc vc ccvcvcvc

32. pushed away.

' cvcc vcv

u
33. Now as news comes in
cv • vc ccvc cvcc vc

34. of each neighbourly murder

vc vc cvcvcv cvcv
To 25 5
’ ~

35. (we)pine for ceremony,

cv cvc cv cvcvcvcv

36. customary rhythms:

cvccvcvcv cvcvcc

37. the temperate footsteps

cv cvccvcvc cVcccvcc

252
38. of a cortege, winding past
vc v cvcvc cvccvc cvcc

39. each blinded home,

vc ccvccvc cvc

40. (Jwonld restore P.&.o'm Pg 250

v cvc cvccv
Pj 256
41. the greatychambepof Boyne,
cv ccvc cvccvc vccvc

42. prepare a sepulchre

ccvcv v cvcvccv

43. under the cupmarked stones,

vccv cv cvcvcc ccvcc

44. out of side-streets and bye-roads

vc vc cvc cccvcc vcc cv cvcc

45. purring family cars

cvcvc cvcvcv cvc

46. nose into line,

cvc vccv cvc

47. the whole country tunes

cv cvc cvcccv ccvcc

48. to the muffled drumming

cvcv cvccc ccvcvc

49. of ten thousand engines,

vc cvc cvcvcc vccvcc

50. SomnambiUant(srome^
cvccvccvcvcc cvcvc
253
51. left behind, move
cvcccvcvcc cvc

52. through emptied kitchens

ccv vcccvc cvcvcc

53. imagining our slow triumph

vcvcvcvc w ccv ccvcc
, . r------X To 2S£ •
54. towards the\mounds)--------- —________
cvcvcc cv cvccc

55. Quiet as a serpent

cwc vc v cvcvcc

56. in its grassy boulevard

vc vcc ccvcv cvcvcvc

57. the procession drags its tail

cv ccvcvcvc ccvcc vcc cvc

58. out of the Gap of the(§ortlj)---- —•—

vc vccv cvc vccv cvcc

59. as its head already enters

vc vcc cvc vccvcvvccvc

60. the megalithic doorway,

cv cvcvcvcvc cvccv

III

61. when they have put the stone

cvc cv cvc cvccv ccvc

62. back in its mouth

cvc vc vcc cvc

254
 p^OV'V *2.5^2-
63. (w$ will driveynort^) again
cv cvcccvc cvcc vcvc , PA^V»a. f£ 2. S ^
\------

64. past Strang and Carling ijords

, cvcccccvc vcc cvcvc cccvcc

65. the cud of memory

cv cvcvccvcvcv

66. allayed for once, arbitration

vcvcc cv vcc vcvccvcvc

67. of the feud placated,

vccv cvc ccvcvcvc

68. imagining those under the hill

vcvcvcvc cvc vccv cvcvc

69. disposed like Gunnar

cvccvcc cvc cvcv

70. who lay beautiful *

cv cv ccvcvcvc
71. inside his burial($jjjjjj^- < ^ ^ ^

vccvc cvc cvcvc cvcc

72. though(Sead)by violence" 2 So.

CV CVC cv cvcvcc

73. and unavenged,

vcc vcvcvccc
To f3 1.56
74. Men said thatCh^ was chanting
cvc cvc cvc cvcvc cvccvc
75. verses about honour
cvcvc vcvc vcv -

255
76. and that four lights burned
vcccvc cv cvcccevcc
PA-otv, P30- 5 3
77. in (comers chamber
VCCVCVC VC VC cvccv
pM>v*\ 2.55”
78. which opened then,‘as\he) turned
cvc vcvcc cvc vc cv cvcc

79. with a joyful face

cvc vcvccvccvc

80. to look at the moon,

cvcvc vccv cvc

Syllabic Structure and Lexical Repetition

256
Parts Stanzas No. of syllables in each line

I I 8 8 5 5

(1)(2)(3)(4)

11 4 5 4 7

(5) (6) (7) (8)

III 4 6 5 6

(9) (10) (11) (12)

IV 4 6 6 5

(13) (14) (15) (16) ,

V 10 5 5 7

(17) (18) (19) (20)

VI 3 7 4 4

(21) (22) (23) (24)

VII 7 4 6 4

(25) (26) (27) (28)

VIII 6 5 5 3

(29) (30) (31) (32)

Cont.

257
n IX 5 t8 7 6
T

(33) (34) (35) (36)

X 5 7 4 4

•
(37) (38) (39) (40)

XI 7 6 6 7

(41) (42) (43) (44)

XII 6 4 5 6

(45) (46) (47) (48)

,
xm 6 6 4 5

* (49) (50) (51) (52)

XIV 7 4 5 7'

(53) (54) (55) (56)

XV 7 7 8 7

(57) (58) (59) (60)

Cont...

258
in XVI 6 4 6 6

(61) (62) (63) (64)

XVII 6 8 6 9

(65) (66) (67) (68) _

XVIII 5 5^-6 6

(69) (70) (71) (72)

XIX 4 7 6 5

•
■
(73) (74) (75) (76)

XX 7 7 5 5

(77) (78) (79) (80)

Table No. 9

259
 One of the most striking aspects of all the bog poems in North

is the insistence on precise sensory detail. One of such poems is

‘Funeral Rites’. In it the parallels between culture and epochs

become explicit as Heaney muses on childhood deaths among family

and friends, contemporary deaths from political violence and the

ancient Viking murders. The remembered funerals of Heaney’s

childhood form the basis of Section I of the poem. These are quite

ordinary pedestrian and unremarkable. Only when Heaney ecounters

/ *

Hie corpses the familiar dead become special, striking and most

importantly Northern. The cortage becomes the focal point of

Section II as the poet removes himself to a role of passive powerless

observer. The funeral glacier of memory transformed into a serpent

in the violent present suggests the presence of evil in the current

events. In the face of such evil the people and poet alike are

important to effect social change.

Let us consider the poem for a detailed linguistic analysis in

order to either confirm critical commentary or reject the subjectivity

of some critical views on the basis of objective observations

emerging from the following analysis.

260
 The poem is written in 80 lines of uneven syllabic length

divided into twenty stanzas of four lines each and further grouped

into three parts. In all there are 219 polysyllabic words as against

103 monosyllabic ones. The predominance of polysyllabic words has

created some difficulty regarding the propositional content of the

poem.

There is no regular end-rhyme scheme used in the poem. Its

*
metrical analysis shows that the basic foot is iambus and it is

modulated, by trochee, dactyl, spondee and pyrrhic in a variety of

ways. The use of pyrrhic and spondee is unusually foregrounded in

the poem which breaks the monotony of the, basic rhythm

intermitantly used.

The line length also varies from dimetre to tetrametre even

occasionally pentametre too.

The poem displays very few instances of sound devices such

as alliteration, consonance and assonance. The following words are

connected by alliteration:

quilted
^cribs (14) now
f %news (33)

261
Consonance is observed in the following words:

shouldered kind manhood (1) had unwrinkled (10)

melted^ veined (17) opened^ turne^ (78)

had^ laid (4) andjveined (18) news^come^ (33)

words mounds (54) when^ stone (61) strang^carling (64)

feud placated (67) inside mound (71) and unavenged (73)

opened^tumed (78)

From the above observation- it will be seen that there is least

phonological' foregrounding in the poem unlike in his earlier poems.

This is possibly because Heaney seems to be moving away from his

focus, on the sound structure of the poem to the grave thematic

concern.

There are 53 run-on and 27 end-stopped lines in the poem.

The predominance of run-on lines indicates the flowing syntax from

one line to the next and often it overruns the stanzaic boundries as

the end rhyme is absent. Naturally there is no metrical pause at the

end of several lines. Consequently the tension between the metrical

pause and the syntactic pull is absent in the poem.

262
 The poem begins with the first person narration and moves on

in a prosaic manner, the second sentence begins at line no. 4 and

moves on upto the line no. 14 in which there is a dense embedding of

a variety of clauses*in the predicate. Again at line no. 15 T is

repeated and the complex sentence continues upto line no. 21. No

verb is used in lines 22 and 23 and a sentence is a long complex

sentence ending at line no. 32. Part II begins with similar pattern of

the use of embedded verb phrase. No verb is used in line no. 38.

Once again the first person T opens the sentence at line no. 40

which has an elongated vp. There is an example of syntactic

inversion at line no. 44 which begins with an adverb of place. The

senetences from line no. 50-54, 55-60, 61-73, 74-80 are repeated

instances of very long predicate short subject type of sentences. Such

a syntactic foregrounding in the poem creates a dense meaning

which emerges when we consider the predicate part of all these

sentences carefully which mainly carries the meaning of the poem

forward.

The use of diction is quite cohesive as the words listed below

are linked at the deep level by a common semantic thread: coffin, lid,

263
eye-lids, hands, rossary beads, knuckles, nails, wrists, shroud, satin,

cribs, candles, flames, nail-heads, crosses, masks, brass, funeral,

murder, ceremony, customary, cortage, chamber, sepulchre, stones,

nose, drumming mounds, serpent, grassy, procession, burial, dead,

violence, unavenged, soranambulent.

Compoundings:

Dough-white hands dulls-brown shroud nail-heads

’i * t

adj. aid]. N adj. adj. N N N

l_______i i_____ i i_____ i

M H M , H H

side-streets by-roads
1______ -J

N N prep. N

H H

Metaphors used/analysed

F nail heads1 dressed with letter gleaming

' crosses (line 24-25) .

Humanizing Metaphor
L (Priests) dlressed with little gleaming

crosses

F dear soapstone masks kissing igloo brows (26-27)

Humanizing
dear mothers kissing their children ^ Metaphor
L

264
F each blinded hope (39)
j- The Humanizing Metaphor
L each blinded person

F purring family cars (45) j- Animistic Metaphor

L purring cats

F the precession drags its tail (57)

J- Animistic Metaphor
L the dog drags its tail „

F I shouldered a kind of manhood (1)

} The Coneretive
L die shouldered the responsibility J Metaphor/Humanizing

F the flames hovering to the women

hovering (19-20)
The Animistic/Humanizing
L the helicopter hovering overheadii Meta
Metaphor

F the black glacier of each funeral (30-31)

Coneretive Metaphor
L the black dress of each women

F the temperate footsteps of a cortage (37-38)

^^ Humanistic
The Animistic Metaphor/
the temperate climate of the Nile Metaphor
L
•r

F blinded hope (39)

h Humanizing Metaphor
L blinded person J

F the muffled drumming of ten thousand

engines (48-49)
1 Coneretive Metaphor/
the muffled drummings of ten thousand J
J Humanistic Metaphor

musical instruments

265
F the megalithic doorway (60) -i
‘ p Synaesthetic Metaphor

L the huge/wide doorway

F the cud of memory (65)

p Animistic Metaphor
L the cud of animal

In this poem Heaney grows to maturity ‘Steeping in to lift the

coffins of dead relations’ (2, 3). He describes the ceremony the

laying out the rosary candles and the ‘black glacier of each funeral’.

In Ireland funerals are much more collective acts of communal

solidarity than England. The whole structure of belief genuinely

spreads the net of grief and widens the range of consolations. The

poet appears to have a degree of detachment for such funerals but

mere observation is shattered by the simple ordinariness of the

adjective ‘dear’ in ‘dear soapstone masks’ to describe the faces of

the dead. The phrase ‘each neighbourly murder’ (line 34) is another

phrase of this kind which may be called grim. It has the note of

intimacy, the common understanding of a code of behaviour. What is

missing here is normal ceremony because the ambushes and the

shootings are too many and too successive.

The serpent imagery is used in the poem to describe the

266
procession which echoes the spiral carving on the stoness there. In

the drive back north Strangford and Carlingford loughs (line 64) will

be restored to their Viking etymologies and pasts and the mourners.

The tomb opened ‘as he tumed/With a joyful face/To look at the

moon’. The poem “is a mass elegy, neither condemnatory, nor

analytic. It simply commemorates and recognizes an ancient heroic

parallel of ‘honour’ and joyousness in heroic death. The whole strife

has become an artefact, in a way”.49

In this poem Heaney begins with an autobiographical

meditation on his experience of death as he grew up in Ireland. The

funerals he remembers are not distinguished as being of particular

people. What dominates the opening section of the poem is a sense

of the rituals and ceremonies which have been established in the

family and the local community for encountering and assimilating

the experience of death, for expressing grief and resuming the flow

of everyday life.

Each funeral follows a routine pattern and the bodies of the dead take

on a uniform appearance:

267
 their eyelids glistening,
their dough-white hands
shackled in rossary beads.
Their puffed nuckles
had unwrinkled, the nails
were darkened, Hie wrists
obediently sloped. (6-12)

In this last image we get a sense of death’s having virtually been

wronght into submission, as the disposition of the corpse conforms

to the requirements of formal arrangements.

As the first section of the poem comes to an end, the sense of

repetitive formality and religious ritual is reinforced. The section

concludes with a certain hint of regret but with a definite sense of

closure and completion (lines 26-32)

Dear soapstone masks,

kissing their igloo brows
had to suffice
before the nails were sunk
and the black glacier
of each fimeral
pushed away. (26-32)

268
 There is a certain poignaey in the cold kiss delivered to the

unyeilding flesh before the coffin lid is hammered in place. This is

the way of each funeral and once the ritual is complete death can be

‘pushed away’ (line 32) and life resumes. The first section of the

poem gives us a sense of death’s having been encompassed by a

ritual in a way that makes the flow of life itself possible.

The second section presents a total contrast to this setteled

cyclic world. In this section we are made to enter the contemporary

situation of the Northen conflict where the natural rhythms of the

community are disrupted by tile rise of sectarian violence leading to.

‘neighbourly murder’ whereas the poet desires a reinstatement of old

routine (lines 35-39).

We pine for ceremony

customary rhythms:
the temperate footsteps
of a cortege, winding past
each blinded home. (35-39)

Heaney recognises that the deep running wound of the conflict could

never be healed by means of such easy familiar pieties. Something

more deeply rooted in the historical fibers of the

269
community is required. Lt is for this reason but the reason that

Heaney offers his vision of a single great funeral arising out of the

north and heading for ‘the great Chambers of Boyne’ in the Irish

Mildand. Heaney again, provides us with a densely interwoven set of

compacted reference. Heaney’s restoration of the Boyne’s Celtic

association takes us back past contemporary and historical conflict to

a point in mythic history where reconciliation of enduring conflict

can be effected. This point is made explicit in the closing section of

the poem where Heaney imagines the end of the funeral with the

mourners returning northwords. They pass by Strang and

Carlingfjords (line 64), a reference to Ireland’s Viking history

detected in these Irish placenames. This memory of Ireland’s Norse

connections summons up in the closing stanzas of the poem.

An uncharacteristic moment of harmony from the epic Icelandic

Njpl’s Saga. The aftermath of Gunner’s death is untypical in the

story and it matches the situation in Ireland.

....Gunnar
who lay beautiful
Inside his burial mound
through dead by violence
and unavenged (69-73)

270
 Gunner thus lies at rest even though his allies have effected no

vengeance killing against his enemies. His story provides an instance

of the cycle of revenge killings being broken and offers hope for

Ireland at a time when the cycle of sectarian murders appears

interminable. The poem ends with an image of peaceful resolution as

Gunner rises within his tomb serene and untroubled.

Men said that he was chanting

verses about honour
and that four lights burned
in comers of the chamber:
which opened then, as he turned
with a joyful force
to look at the moon (74-80)

The vision which Heaney offers here of easy reconciliation

and sublime peacefulness is not sustained throughout North.
In this poem as Parker puts it “Heaney journeys from the
natural deaths/unnatural savagery of die past and present towards
‘a dream of forgiveness, the dream of the possiblity of
forgivenes’”.50 The poem■ends with an image of resurrection, a

further reminder of how the poet retains a love of Christian myths

and respect for Christ’s values despite the lamentable behaviour of
‘Christians’ in Ireland.
271
 North
* x / I* x» / /
1. I returned to a long strand,
* / IX / IX X /
2. the hammered shod of a bay,
X / I / x x / > %
3. and foundjonly die (secular
/X X/X X/lX/.XX
4. powers of/the Atlantic thundering.

X / , X / ' * x
5. I faced) the ui
x x // X X f I X
6. invitations of/Iceland
X x // X I / X x
7. the pathetic/colonies
X / )X X ,/ X X
8. of Greenland, and [suddenly

f X. / x . / x
9. those fapulousjraiders,
/ /'lXX/|XX|/'X
10. those lying in Orldiey and/Dublin

11. jneasured/agamst

12. their long| swords ruling,

/ x r . / x
13. those in the]solid
/XX/ /
14. belly of stone ships,

272
 / / M / 1 X // X
17. were ocean-deafened voices
/ X , •/ f jX x /
18. wanung me, lifted again
X / > X xX jX
ix .xx i/
1/ xX
19. in violence andjepiphjany.
X / tX / 1x /
20. Tlie longship’s swimming tongue

21. was buoyant withjhindsight-

x / | / / )X /
22. it said/Thor’s hammer swung
23. to gec^rapfiyjand trade,

/ / I X / IA X t X ^ 1X
24. thick-witted coumiqgs and/revenges,

A / /* X t* M 1
25. the hatreds and /behinabacks

j
26. of the) altlung lies andjwomen,
X / |X Xj X /jX /
27. exhaustions nominated peace,
28. memory/incubi^mg diejspilled blood.

X / . ' f
29. It said^'Lie down
30. m thejword-hoardj burrow
A / |x /
31. the coil and gleam
32. of yourjfurrowedjbrain.

x / ,x / ,x
33. Compose in darkness.

273
 * / iX //•/ '/* *
'■
34. Except) aurora borealis
XX / jX /
35. in the long) foray
A x | ✓ x |X t
36. but no/ cascade] of light.

37. Keep your/eye clear

X X I l X j x x 1/ 7
38. as the) bleb of|the icicle,
/■ x | / xj/ r i/x
39. trust the) feel ofjwhat nubbed treasure
X / i X f
40. your hands) have known. ’

Metrical Structure

274
 North

returned to a([ong^strand,
cvcvcc cvvcvc cccvcc

2. tlie(jiammereq) shod of a bay,

cv cvcvc cvc vcvcv

3. and found only the secular

vcccvcc vccvcv cvcvcv-
/

4. powers of the Atlantic thundering.

\ cvcvc vccv vccvccvc cvccvcvc

5. (Jjfaced the unmagical

vcvcc. cvvccvcvcvc

6. invitations of Iceland
vccvcvcvcc vc vccvcc

7. the pathetic colonies

cv cvcvcvc cvcvcvc

8. of Greenland, and suddenly

vcccvccvcc vcc cvcccv

9. (thosj^ fabulous raiders,

(cvc cvccvcvc cvcvc

10. Qhosg)lying in Orkney and Dublin

cvc cvvcvc vccv vcc cvccvc

11. measured against

cvcvc vcvccc

12. theiiijon^ swords rusting,

CV cvc ccvcc cvccvc

275
 ] 6 ^. l°3
JhosjMn the solid l—^
eve veev eveve

14. belly of stone ships,

, cvcv vc ccvc cvcc '

15. (those)hacked and glinting

eve cvcc vcc ccvccvc

16. in the gravel of thawed streams

veev ccvcc vc eve cccvcc

17. were ocean-deafened voices

cv veve cvcvcc eveve

18. warning me; lifted again

eveve cv cvccvcvcvc

19. in violence and epiphany

vc cvcvcc vccvcvcvcv

20. The longship’s swimming tongue

cv cvccvcc ccvcvc eve

21. was buoyant with hindsight-

eve cvcc eve cvcccvc
---------------------1 P^o-rvi fg
22. it said Thor’s\hammej)swung ^------ '
ve eve eve evcv eeve

23. to geography and trade,

cv cvccvcv vcc ccvc

24. thick-witted couplings and revenges,

eve eveve cvccvcc vcc cvcvccvc

25. the hatreds and behindbacks

cv cvccvcc vcc cvcvcccvcc
276
26. of the althing, lies and women,
vc cv vccvc cvc vcc cvcvc

27. exhaustions nominated peace,

vccvcvcc cvcvcvcvc cvc

28. memory incubating the spilled blood,

cvcvcv vcccvcvcvccv ccvcc ccvc

29. It said, ‘Lie down

vc cvc cv cvc

30. in the word-hoard, burrow

vc cv cvc cvc cvcv

31. the coil and gleam

cv cvc vcc ccvc

32. offyouj) furrowed brain,

vc cv cvcvc ccvc

33. Compose in darkness,

cvccvc vc cvccvc

34. Except aurora borealis

vcccvccvcvcv cvcvcvc

35. in
A**, ts »4s“
vc cv cvc cvcv

36. but no cascade of light,

cvc cv cvccvc vc cvc
To P?
37. Keep(youj) eye clear
cvc cv v ccv

277
38. as the bleb of the icicle,
vc cv ccvc vc cv vcvcc

39. trust the feel ofwhatnubbed treasure

ccvcccv cvcvccvc cvcc ccvcv

40. (your)hands have known.5 -<r

cv cvccc cv cvc

Syllabic Structure and Lexical Repetition

278
Stanzas No. of syllalbles in each line
*

I 7 7 8 S
(1) (2) (3) (4)
n 6 7 7 7
(5).(6) (7) (8)
III 6 9 4 5
(9) (10) (11) (12) .
IV 5 5 5 7
(13) (14) (15) (16)
V 7 7 7 6_
(17) (18) (19) (20)
VI 6 6 6 9
(21) (22) (23) (24)
VII 6 7 8 9
(25) (26) (27) (28)
VIII 4 6 4 5
(29) (30) (31) (32)
IX 5 7 5 6
(33) (34) (35) (36) •
X 4 8 8 4
(37) (38) (39) (40)

Table No. 10

279
 It is a title poem of the volume in which Heaney receives a

message from the Viking raiders. In it Heaney imagines his way into

the world of those into ‘fabulous raiders’, not one of their decendents

but as the decendents of their victims. Throughout the poem, as we

*

shall see, Heaney relies primarily on words of

Northem-Anglo-Saxon and Norse origin, words that carry him

elymolgically into that era he imagines. This poem stands as the first

of a lengthy series in which a voice offers Heaney wisdom very

much in line with the direction his poetry would take. It recurs

throughout the subsequent book, particularly in several poems in the

, t

Station Island sequence.

In the following analysis-,- both critical and linguistic, I am

going to work out in detail the use of language with reference to

(i) the sound devices (ii) diction used and (iii) syntactic structures, all

helping us . to get into the poem and locate the appropriate

propositional meaning implied by Heaney. I am also going to

consider the poem in the light of its critical assessment done by

several critics.

280
 The poem is written in 40 lines of varying length between 6-7

syllables per line. The dense foregrounding of 62 polysyllabic words

used in the poem surely suggests the level of difficulty of the poem.

The poem does not follow any specific end-rhyme scheme as

such. It is exactly like the earlier poem ‘Funeral Rites’. The lines are

mainly trimetre type and occasionally they are dimetre type. The

metrical analysis of the poem shows that the basic rhythm is rising
h

one with the use of 40 iambuses and 11 anapaests.'The large number

of trochees (20) and dactyls (7) create falling rhythm occasionally.

The use of pyrrhics and spondees functions as occasional

modulations and either speed up the poem or check its speed

occasionally. The line 1 opens with an anapaest followed by a

pyrrhic and spondee. The use of feet here is very much

complementary to the meaning it suggests.

The majority of the lines m the poem is of run-on type which

helps the narrative overflow across stanzas. The phonetic structure of

die poem is again similar to that of the ‘Funeral Rites’. It does not

seem to have been very neatly structured. Although there is hardly

any specific end rhyme scheme observed in the poem, the

281
foregrounding of consonance creates music in the poem. The

following words are connected by alliteration and consonance*

Alliteration: keep^clear (37) trasT^traeasure (39)

hands~^have (40)

Consonance: ' returned^ strand(1) hammered^shod (2)

and . found (3) Greenland and (8)

those raiders (9) in Dublin (10)

buoyant hindsight (21) couplings revenges (24)

spilled blood (28) word hom'd (30)

but light (36)

The poem is narrated in the first person in lines 1-28 after

which the mode changes to direct speech from line nos. 29-40.

Almost all the lines me straightforward and there is hardly any use of

syntactic deviation. Upto line no. 32 Heaney does not use capital

letters with which the lines should begin. This gives an impression

that syntax flows in the poem in a very natural manner.

The choice of diction in the poem is quite remmkable since it

belongs to a certain register. The words like strand, shod, bay,

Atlantic thundering, Iceland colonies, Greenland, raiders, Orkney,

282
Dublin, gravel, thod, streams, ocean deadened voices, epiphony,

longship and buoyant create a cohesive structure of meaning in the

poem giving rise to other related connotations.

Tlie following methphors are observed in the poem.

F Tlie secular/powers of Atlantic

t

thundering (line 3-4) The Synaesthetic

J Metaphor
L The secular/powers of North

countries

F The solid/belly of stoneships (13-14)'i . . .. w

F v 'V Animistic Metaphor

L The solid/belly of the animal

F The longship’s swimming tongue (20)

j- Humanizing Metaphor
L The longship* s swimming pool J

F Memory incubating the

spilled blood (28)

j- Animistic Metaphor
L Hens incubating eggs

F The coil and gleam/of your

furrowed brain (31-32)

r Synaesthetic Metaphor
L The gleam of your bright face J

283
Simile: keep yourfeye}clear as thejblebfof the icicle (37-38)
T V

Throughout the poem Heaney relies primarily on the words of

Northern Anglo-Saxon origin. These words cany Heaney

etymologically into the era he imagines. In the opening stanza he

“returns”, meaning going back to the past ‘to a long strand/the

hammered shod of the bay’. The four italicized words are derived

from Germanic. They play off one another, echoing consonantal and

vowel patterns in a way which emphasises their conscious choice.

Later he refers to those Vikings “hacked and glinting/in the gravel of

tliod streams”, phrases in which every word stems from old English

or Norse except “gravel” which comes from old French. Heaney

avoids words of Greek or Latin origin so carefully that when he uses

one as in the phrase “violence and epiphany”, its appearance shocks

the reader into awareness of its basis and meaning.

Another point of entry into the Viking period is the sea itself.
*

The poet standing by the “Atlantic thundering”, finds himself

umoved by the “unmagical/the invitations of Iceland/The pathetic

colonies/Of Greenland”, while the Viking raiders speak to him in

284
“ocean deafened voices” “lifted again/in violence and epiphany”.

The whole Viking culture speaks to the poet not through the vaguely

disembodied remains of the warriors themselves but, in a brilliant

and bold metaphor, through the “longship’s” swimming tongue.

“Ritual is undoubtedly a value and a method as well as a

subject in North. It sets and sets off the emblems”.51 While of course

learning that some rituals have more in their favour than others,

Heaney empolys the term a little oddly at times : “The long rites of

Irish political and religious struggles” “The decorative tinge that

Heaney imparts to violence and to history derives from a rituahsing

habit, which itself derives from the religious sensibility. The

continual catalogues in North - wheather the details of the bog

people, inventaries of objects like “antler-pins” or historical

summaries as in the message of the longship-level disperate

experience into a litany, a rosaiy, a faintly arcaic incantation’?52 as in

‘Viking Dublin’.

285
 The last three quatrains of ‘North’ add an aesthetic taste to the

subject matter it has already supplied.

It said, ‘Lie down

in the word-hoard, burrow
the coil and gleam
of your furrowed brain
Compose in darkness.
Except aurora borealis
in the long foray
but no cascade of light.
Keep your eye clear
■ as the bleb of the icicle,
trust the feel of what nubbed treasure
your hands have known.’ (29-40)

This self dedication hints at a purpose- “long foray”-beyond

“befitting emblems”, and to which Heaney’s sensuous intimacy with

his world, that is “nubbed treasure” might contribute a value as well

as an “explanation”.;Like Ted Hughes Heaney turns his instinctive

beliefs into a philosophy.

‘North’ takes us immediately back into cold, salty reality, after

9

the “beatific affirmation” of‘Funeral Rites’. Re-visiting the Donegal

286
shoreline to take breath, to take stock, to find some kind of

confirmation, Heaney hears at first “only the secular/powers of the

k

Atlantic thundering”, rather than the voice, of God or Thor. From out

of this noise emerges a sound warning him against the temptations of

‘violence and epiphany’, raiding atrocity to make art. “The final

version indicates how Heaney is all too aware of the morally

hazardous relationship between art/myth and killing; though the

artist has a responsibility to his community to commemorate the

deaths of martyrs in the national struggle;.-.. ..”53.

287
 Conclusion
During 1966-1975 Heaney wrote a number of poems and

published five anthologies. These antholoiges have the themes such

as local native world, domestic and familiar, public and personal

* i
/

concerns, the theme of history, nationalism, darkness, fear,

childhood memories, rituals, the lost rural heritage, love, Northern

Irish conflict, the theme of language and preservation, art, the sense
i

of doubleness, tradition, the natural and animal . world, dying trades,

i

Irish culture and the poet’s art as;a force.

Heaney’s rural background provides a starting point for almost

all his poetry but especially his early work which is often an

exploration of the meaning of childhood experience.

In Death of a Naturalist Heaney creates the natural world and

the natural world meant to Heaney is his father ploughing and

• i ,

digging, butter being churned, h^s . collection of frogspawn, picking

*

blackberries hanging around the1 bam and riverbank, looking down

wells. Heaney makes these memories vivid through the gift of

recreating the physical actuality of the external world. The centre of

his imaginative world is the centre of family and

community life. He attempts to define and interprete the present by

bringing it into significant relationship with the past. Dominated by a

sense of nature’s powers, he sees history, language and myth as

bound up with nature, territory and landscape. He engages in the act

of restoration, mending the bridge between past familial tradition and

present discontinuity.

Heaney uses traditional forms to suit the modulations of his

individual poetic voice and vision, colloquialism, the effects of

classical and Biblical allusions, and the use of Ulster dialect words.

It is interesting to notice that the titles of Heaney’s anthologies

as well as poems written in this phase are suggestive. They alone

speak of his subjects- the nature, seasons, the countryside,

community, a sense of the past, the condition/situation and the

menace in Irish life. The continuity can be seen on the thematic level

as well as formal level. Death ofa Naturalist and Door into the Dark

Heaney mostly preoccupies himself with a Kavanagh inspired

engagement with ‘the unregarded data of usual life’. The volumes

contain a small number of poems which advert in some way to the

t

situation in Ireland.

289
 It is quite significant that Heaney ends one collection with a

poem which serves as a sort of manifesto for the volume to follow.

North is continuous with Wintering Out, as Door into the Dark with

Death of a Naturalist, thematically as well as formally as he gives

further bog poems in the volume. Throughout Wintering Out Heaney

emphasizes speech patterns and ‘images' of tongue’ as Blake

Morrison notes. In part I of North, throughout the volume in general

there is insistence on precise sensory detail. In part II Heaney deals

«

primarily with the Irish history, especially the backgrounds and

events of the Troubles in Ulster. In ‘North’ generally in the title

poem, Heaney strains against the commonness of the language to

/ ■

make it strange to us, to regain its foreign qualities.

Heaney uses images of farming community as his subjects,

‘Digging’ metaphor which is used in the opening poem marks

Heaney’s departure from the traditional profession. This metaphor of

V

‘digging’ is exploited in many of his anthologies.

The strength of language is the significant characteristic of

Heaney’s early poems. A highly sensous rendering of his

surroundings are made more concrete by the solidity of his

290
surprising word choice.

Heaney’s attempt to use foregrounding at all levels

particularly, phonetic and lexical is seen. In his early poems Heaney

is more cautious about the form and content but later he starts

loosening them, became less cautious.

Heaney selects the everyday material and fashions it to

something astounding. He defamiliarizes the familiar thing by using

a suitable style, metaphors, lexis/diction, language and metre. In his

* f

poems we see the operations of conscious craft.

Heaney’s brilliancy of description is seen in the poems such as

‘Blackberry Picking’, ‘Churning Day’ and ‘Death of a Naturalist’.

His poetry offers the attractions of sensual and aural gratification.

The linguistic foregrounding is so dominant that we cannot set it

aside and think of its semantic structure. The lexical repetition is

predominent in his poem of this phase. Texture and structure are

seen as aids to meaning considering relative simplifications of

childhood in a language which is unmistakably loud and confident.

m x ca r

291
 Notes and References

1. ‘Poets on Poetry’, The Listener. 8 November, 1973, p. 629.

2. Andrew Murphy, Seamus Heaney. U. K. Northcole House,

1996, p. 8.

3. Michael Parker, Seamus Heanev: The Making of The Poet

' London, Macmillan, 1993, p. 62.

4. Thomas C. Foster, Seamus Heanev. Dublin, The O’Brien Press,

1989, p. 17.

5. Michael Parker, Seamus Heanev: The Making of the Poet.

London, Macmillan, 1993, p. 63.

6. Thomas C. Foster, Seamus Heanev. Dublin, The O’Brein

Press, 1989, p. 37.

7. Ibid.

8. Ronald Mathias, ‘Death of a Naturalist’ in The Art of Seamus

* i

Heaney, ed., Tony Curtis, Bridgend, Seren 1994, p. 18.

9. Ibid. p. 17.

10. Michael Parker, Seamus Heanev: The Making of The Poet

London, Macmillan, 1993, p. 63.

292
11. Ronald Mathias, “Death of a Naturalist”, in The Art of Seamus

Heanev. ed. Tony Curtis, Bridgend, Seren, 1994, p. 17.

12. Thomas C. Foster, Seamus Heanev. Dublin, The O’Brien Press,

1989, p. 13.

13. Andrew Murphy, Seamus Heanev. U. K., Northcole House,

1996, p. i2.

14. Michael Parker, Seamus Heanev: The Making of The Poet

London, Macmillan, 1993, g. 62.

15/ Thomas C. Foster, Seamus Heanev. Dublin, The O’Brien Press,

1989, p. 17.

16. Michael Parker, Seamus Heanev: The Making of The Poet

London, Macmillan, 1993, p. 62.

17. Tony Curtis, How to Study Modern Poetry. London,

Macmillan, 1990, p. 120.

18. Neil Corcoran, A Students Guide to Seamus Heanev. London,

1986, p. 44.

19. Tony Curtis, How to Study Modem Poetry. London,

. (r

Macmillan, 1990, P. 121.

20. Ibid., p.122.

293
21. Ibid.

22. Ibid:

23. Ronald Tamplin, Seamus Heanev. Milton Keynes, Philadelphia,

Open University Press, 1989, p. 17.

24. Ronald Mathias, “Death of a Naturalist” in The Art of Seamus

Heanev. Bridgend, Seren, 1982, p. 24.

25. Elmer Andrews, ‘The Poetry of Seamus Heanev: All the

Realms of Wisoer’. London, Macmillan, 1989, p. 9.

26. Murphy, Andrew, Seamus Heanev. U. K,, Northcole House,

1996, p. 14.

27. Ronald Mathias, “Death of a Naturalist” in The Art of Seamus

Heanev. ed. Tony Curtis, Bridgend, Seren, 1994, p. 20.

28. Ibid.

29. Ibid., p. 19.

30. Ronald Tamplin, Seamus Heanev. Milton Keynes,

Philadelphia, Open University Press, 1989, p.30.

r

31. Andrew Murphy, Seamus Heanev. U. K., Northcole House,

1996, p. 21.

32. Ibid.

294
33. Ibid.

34. Ibid., p.22-23.

35. Dick Davis, “Door into the Dark” in The Art of Seamus

Heanev. ed. Tony Curtis, Bridgend, Seren, 1994, p. 33.

36. Ibid., p. 34.

37. Ibid.

38. Thomas C. Foster, Seamus Heanev. Dublin, The O’Brien Press,

1989, p. 6.

39. Ibid., p.29-30.

40. Andrew Murphy, Seamus Heanev. U. K., Northcole House,

1996, p. 24.
v

41. Tony Curtis, (ed.) The Art of Seamus Heanev. Bridgend, Seren,

1994, p. 99. ■

42. Andrew Murphy, Seamus Heanev. U. K., Northcole House,

1996, p. 38.

43. Michael Parker, Seamus Heanev: The Making of the Poet

London, Macmillan, 1993, P. 91.

44. Ibid., p.108.

45. Ibid., p. 108-9.

295
46. Ibid., p. 105-6.

47. Ibid., p.106-7.

48. Edna’Longley, “Inner Emigre” or “Artful Voyeur” ? Seamus

Heaney’s North”, in Seamus Heanev: Contemporary Critical

Essays, ed. Allen Michael, London, Macmillan, 1997, p. 34.

49. Ronald Tamplin, Seamus Heanev. Milton Keynes Philadelphia,

*

Open University Press, 1989, p. 56.1.

50. Michael Parker, Seamus Heanev: The Making of die Poet.

London, Macmillan, 1993, p. 130.

51. Edna Longley, “Inner Emigre or Artful Voyeur ? Seamus

Heaney’s North” in Seamus Heanev: Contemporary Critical

Essays, ed. Allen Michael, London, Macmillan, 1997, p. 51.

52. Ibid.

53. Michael Parker, Seamus Heanev: The Making of the Poet

/

London, Macmillan, 1993, p. 132.

296
CHAPTER iV
PHASE II
 CHAPTER IV
Phase Bl

The second phase of Seamus Heaney’s poetry covers the

period from 1979-1987 and includes the anthologies, Field Work

(1979), Station Island (1984) and The Haw Lantern (1987); besides

dining these years he translated Buile Suibhe as Sweeney Astray

(1983), co-edited with Ted Hughes The Rattle Bag - anthology of

poetry for children (1982) and Selected Poems- 1965-75 (1980)

which includes the poems selected from the earlier four anthologies.

Heaney who proclaimed confidently, T rhyme/to see myself,

<
at the end of Death of a Naturalist,. now depicts himself as a

fifteen years of violence, alienation, growth, learning to stand ‘his

ground determinedly in the local plight- he firms to an uncertain

future of conditions. And so he felt the need 4f adjusting his poetic

style to the ambitious task he has set for himself;

From the world of nature and childhood memories Heaney has

set out to involve himself more directly with the facts of life around

him in Ireland. The darker themes of earlier books do harden and

297
locate themselves in contemporary events now. Heaney’s task which

he sets for himself is to deal with ‘The Troubles’ by developing the

imagery out of his ‘own terrain’. His ppetry is now clearly

committed to dealing with the violent situation in Ireland e.g.

‘Triptych’. Naturally the sense of Irish nationality became the major

theme of some of his poems, for example, ‘The Toome Road’.

Field Work is meant to be read in its, totality and its overall

i

effect is that of a useful structure reflecting a unity of purpose.

Heaney clarifies his role in ‘The Troubles’; The poems of this

i

collection deal with Heaney’s present experiences and people whom

he know. He doesn’t classify Field Work into numbered sections as

he did in both Wintering Out and North. However we can see the

three groupings in the volume:

i

‘Oysters’ opens the volume with a declaration of intent- the

poet will ‘eat the day’, consume the reality of violence in Ulster and

work towards a vision that will match the depth of tragedy around

him. His reaction to the Troubles is seen in the poem such as

‘Triptych’. The elegies such as ‘The Strand at Lough Beg’, ‘In

Memoriam Francis Ledwidge’, ‘A Postcard From North Antrim’,

298
 and ‘Casualty’ express the sense of loss- loss of family members,

friends and those who live in Ulster. Positive human virtues are

celebrated in -the love and marriage poems of Glanmore Sonnets. It

l

seems that for the first time in his poetic career Heaney has deployed

the poetic forms such as sonnets, elegies and lyrics profusely.

Heaney places the Sonnet form - ‘Glanmore Sonnets’ in Field Work,

‘Clearances’ in Ihe Haw Lantern - centrally where his language

matches the emotional pitch of his feelings. His choice of the Sonnet

form indicates his desire to_establish the old Values of order, after the

' highly politicized, quatrains of North.

Field Work represents a clear progression from his earlier

work in a way in which Heaney is trying tp understand the events

around him and practise his art meaningfully in that context. It seems

that Heaney wants to show that poetry the guh can be used positively

but oh a different level. He emphasizes the Ipower of. song in ‘The

i
Singer’s House’. The poem expresses the belief that poetry seems to

bring change in the attitudes.

Heaney started reflecting upon the exeipplary conduct of other

i ‘

poets who lived through and responded to tihe viciousness of their

299
times- such as Wilfred Owen, Osip Mandlestam, W. B. Yeats,
it

Zbigniew Herbert and Holub.

Heaney’s skill in responding to the challenges of events in

i
Ireland displays a growth in Heaney’s stature as a[ poet. He develops

his craft to match his vision in this phase and it is observed in the

poems such as ‘The Harvest Bow’, a. tightly - wrought poem.. It’s

form complementing the central image has five stanzas of six lines

rhyming or half-rhyming in a couplet. Internal rh^me and assonance

are used to create a woven forat-

His various metaphors particularly ‘diggingf leads him to ‘dig’

into Irish earth through the layers of history, language and tradition.

There are many poems about Irish history and the bid language of his
' i
country. For example, ‘Sibyl’ ends with a grim imhge of Ireland.

We can observe several poems including ‘Tjhe Strand at Lough

Beg’ with regular decasyllabic rhymed,- half-rhymed lines, the

effective use and present tense, of visually cohcrete details. His

attempts to converse with and question the dead in the poems.

Heaney appears to have used his perception of religion and

literary myth in reflecting on personal and political history. His

300
collection Station Island is very ambitious in intensifying personal
i

experience through various myths. Some pbets such as Dante, Eliot,

Yeats influenced him as his predecessors ahd Kavanagh Hugh, Hill

as contemporaries. Heaney surely uses mytjhlogy to suit his themes

and makes such poems very effective. For example, he chooses a

number of myths from Dante and Virgil in Station Island. ‘Sweeney

myth’ taken from Buile Suibne is used in the third part of

Station Island.

Station Island has three sections. Th^ first deals with a group

of self-contained lyrics. The second uses; a model deriving from

St. Patrick’s Purgatory. The third section trends these two- ‘living

and dead’, and uses the Medieval Sweeney myth for personal
i *'
experience. The three parts are interwoven! with common allusions

and images and the most of the poems are mythical.

The opening poem of Station Island called ‘The Underground’

develops a relationship in terms of a pair of walks through the

underground London. The location seerhs to suggest another

1 '*

classical underground. Heaney draws on classical folk and Biblical

sources. ‘Shelf Life’ comprised of six small! poems- ‘Granite Chip’,

301
‘Old Smoothering Iron’, ‘Old Pewter’, ‘Iron Spike’, ‘Stone from

Delphi’, ‘A Snowshoe’- on objects natural and man made. The

sequence celebrates the lasting power of thjings and like so much of

his earlier poetry, investigates objects of racial memory.

‘A Snowshoe’ is in part about writing poetry. It becomes a writing

talisman as the act of writing poetry is a principle focus.

‘A Migration’ is one of the poems that examines the lives of the

ordinary people around him. ‘The Loaning’ discusses the writer’s

involvement with words and images especially ‘lost words’,

‘The Sandpit’ with its parody of ‘The Waste Land’. It clearly should

be taken as a poem about poetry and draws comparisons to skilled

craft, in this case brickmaking and bricklaying.

i

The title sequence in Station Island jgives an opportunity to i

confront the ghosts as throughout Heaney’s career lie has shown a

tendency to be haunted by ghosts - familiar, political, literary. The

sequence consists of 12 poems, each detailing an encounter with the

spirit of some person Heaney has known personally, through his

reading or whose life or death had an impact on him. e.g. Simon

Sweeney, Dante, Chekov and so on.

302.
 “Throughout the sequence Heaney refuses to be dictated by

the metrical form, instead taking liberties as he pleases, rhyming

only occasionally and fitting the metrics to the rhythms of spoken

language rather than sacrificing speech to poetic convention. This

! *

rather ‘freewheeling’ approach to more or less traditional metrics is

an outgrowth of his work in the early 70s:”1 In Blake Morrison’s

i .J
opinion, “Heaney often distictly uncomfirtable working within

conventional forms in his early years, frequently sacrificing sense or

1
\

euphony to formal tyrrany”2. Throughout hi$ career he has made the

i
connection between the ‘Orange drums’ of; Ulster Prostestants and
t
the ‘iambic drums’ of English poetic tradition.”3
\

Once again Heaney in his seventh voljume, The Haw Lantern,

returns to his recurrent themes.

‘Alphabets’ explores his lifelong, involvement with written

language. Throughout the poem the movement is from the local and
i

personal toward the universal. “The HaW Lantern” deals with

parables, allegories, satires of Irish religious, social and political life.

Some of his parable poems are ‘From the Land of the Unspoken’

‘Parable Island’ and from the Canton of Expectation’.

303
 Several lesser poems also exploit Heaney’s new visionary

stance. For example, ‘The Song of the Bullets’, ‘The Disappearing

Island’, ‘The Mud Vision’ and the title poem kThe Haw Lantern’.

The most completely Irish, Ulster situation of all arises in his

remarkable sonnet sequence, ‘Clearances’, written in memory of his

mother. Heaney reimmerses himself in the familial, domestic, world

- i

he once seemed to have abondoned in verse.

Heaney is not satisfied with recording the Troubles, he insists

1

on universalizing the situation in the poems duch as ‘Parable Island’

and ‘From the Canton of Expectation’. He cdmpares the situation of

the writer in the North of Ireland to the writjers of American South

l.

especially Flannery O ‘Connor’ and Williaiii Faulkner. Heaney is

i
i
concerned with the situation in Ireland and j also he sees it in the

broader context of human difficulties. His1 American experience

seems to have offered him a distance from which he views the

Troubles.

The poems which seem to represent this phase have been

selected for a detailed critical analysis with a focus on the use of

poetic language. Their analysis shows Heaney’s thematic concerns

304
and stylistic features common to them noticed in the poems written

during the phase. The poems are as follows:

Field Work: 1) Field Work

2) Sonnets for Ann. Sadjdlemyer- Sonnet No. 1

3) Sonnet No. 2

Station Island: 1) Station Island Sequeriee-1

2) The First Flight

The Haw Lantern: l) The Haw Lantern

2) The Mud Vision :

* i

Now let us consider the poem ‘Field Work’.

305
 Field Work

I
/ x I / X|/ / if *| / x »/
1. where the sally jtree went (pale in every (breeze
/ / / x , / xjx /ix / ;i/ /
2. where the]perfect eye of pie nesting blackbird watched,
( f . / x |/J ./
3. where one/fern was always green

* X / |X / fX x
4. I was standing watching you
/ X]/ X X 1 / / IXX.j )(
5. Take the pad from thelgatehousel at thejcrossing

r
fsmell

/ x / XXj / x ,/ / ./!
10. waggoiy after/waggoiyfull of/big-e$d/cattlfe.

II
X X /XX/1 x / r x x | * / ■
11. But yoiuj vaccination mark is on jyour thinjgh,
X X r X r I /x| X / -
12. and O/that’s liealep into/the bark.

X / lx r ix xj/ x
13. Except/a dryad’^ not alwoman
X X I X / 1* X
14. You are my wounded dryad

306
 * x / I y x / ia /
15. in a smothering smelf of wet
X / / / / / /
16. and ringf-wormed chestnuts.

X ( }X t IX /
17. Our moony was small/and far,
x x, /. / ./ x
18. was afcom long/gazed at

r x ,x x | r f
19: brilliantpn mejPequod's mast
K/|XfrXX /\t xt / X
20. across Altanpc and Pacific ]lvaters.

Ill
/ x , / /
21. Not the mud slick,
/ x i/ 7 i* /}x
22. not the black weejdy water
/ XI / X 1 / x 1/ / ]/.
23. full on alder cones and) pock-marked leaves,

24. Mot the) cow paisley in [winter

X X I / / fX / \X / ’
25. with itsjold whitened shines and wrists,
X f }X x I x /. X
26. its sipilancej its shaking.

' /i-x X / / / | / x }/ x
27. Not e/ven the) tart green/ sliade of/summer
/. x I / x *
28. thick with)butterflies -
x / ix r |X )c i/ x t / x
29. and fungus plump as a leather [saddle.

307
 / x .X * / / X
30. No. Buy in a still/corner,
/ X. X / . / /
31. braced to| its pebble-pashed wall,
/ / i / t I / x .1/
32. heavy, earth/drawn, all mouth and/eye,

X / I / X I / X J / X
33. the sunflower,/dreammg/umber.

IV
/ / / ,
34. catspiss/smell,
x / / /,x
35. the pinkfbloom oj|bn:
X / |X /
36. I press a leaf
37. of the fleering(current
x x / ix * /
38. on the back/of your hand
XX/./ /
39. for the tight/ slow bum
X * // X /
40. of its sticky juice

41. to prime/your skin,

X x f ix x. /
' 42. and your veins/to be crossed
/ / f /
43. criss-crossjwith leaf/veins.
* ?, x /
44. I lick kny thumb
X / iX * /
45. and dip] it in mould,
^ x / I.X X / x
46. I anoint/the anointed

308
47. Leaf-shape.| Mould

48. blooms andjpigments

* / I* /
49. tlie back of your hand
r x# / /
50. like a/birthmark -
X /, * t
51. my umber one,
X X | / f
52. you are [stained, stained

53. to perfection.

Metrical Structure

309
 Field work

^where)the sally tree went pale in every breeze

cv cv cvcvccv cvcccvc vc vdvcv ccvc

2. (where)the perfect eye of the nesting blackbirdtwatchec

cv cv cvcvcc v vc cv cvccvcb ccvccvc^cvcc
To Pq 31.2-
(where) one fern was alwaysfgreem-
vc cvcc cvc vccvc

4. Q)was standing(w5chin^ou) _ ^ ^ 311,3(4_____^

/ v cvc ccvccvc cvcvc cv

5. Take the pad from the gatehouse at the crossing

cvc * cv cvc ccvc cv cvccvc ; vq cv ccvcvc

6. and reach to lfit „a white wash off ^he whins. .

vcccvc cvcvccv cvc cvc vc cv cvcc To fg 3 tz

7. Q)could siee the@ccination made)

vcvc. cv vc cvccvcvfcvc cvc
1° Pj 3
8. : stretched on(youp uppep arm, arid (^tjielj) the coal mnelj)
cccvcc vc cv vcv vc vcc cdvc cv cvc ccvc

9. of tlie train/that comes petween usja slow goods

vccv ccvc cvc cvcc cvccvc vc v ccv cvcc
G
10. (waggon)aper(jyaggo^)ftill of big-e^d cattle. .
cvcc /ccv cvcc 3VC vc cvc vc cvcc
3 [.
II
11- But(yo^vaccination ma$)is on(ypi^)thingh,
cvc cv cvccvcvcvc cvc vc vc cv cv

310
12. and O that’s healed into the bark, 1

vc. cvcc cvcc vecvcv cvc

13. Except a^jryadj not a woman

vccvce v 6cvcc\c\rc v evcve
(3 3,0
14. (ifoy)are my wounded(dryac|
cv v cv cvccvc ccwc
1 311
15. in a smothering(smellJof wet ■^r
•vc v cvcvcvc ccvc vc cvc

16. and ring-wormed chestnuts. .

vcc cvc cvcc cvcccvcc

17. Our moon was small and far, .

w cvc cvc ccvc vcccv

18. was a coin long gazed at

cvc vcvc cvc cvcc vc

19. brilliant on the Pequod’s mast

ccvcvcc vc- cv cvcvcc cvcc

20. across Altantic and Pacific (waters^

vccvc- vccvccvc vcc cvcvcvc cvcvc :

III

21. le mud slick,

cvccv cvc ccvc To Pq 2>\:
7^
22. (not)the black weedyfwater
cvccv ccvc cvcv cvcv

23. Ml of alder cones and pock-marked leaves,

cvc vc ccv cvcc vcc cvc cvcc cvcvc

311
24. (notjthe cow parsley in winter
/CVCCV CV CVCCV VCCVCCV Clow, f3 31!

25. with its old whitened shines and wrists,

cvc vccvcccvcvcc cvcc vcc cvccc

26. \ its sibilance, its shaking.

\vcc cvcvcvcc vcc cvcvc

27. (Not)even the tart (gn^shade of summer < f»w, ?3 3,0

cvcvcvccv cvcccvc cvc vccvcv

28. thick with butterflies

cvc cvc cvcvccvc
\

29. and fungus plump as a leather saddle,

vcc cvccvc ccvcc vcvcvcv cvcc

30. No. Butin a still corner,

cv cvc vc v ccvc cvcv

31. braced to its pebble-dashed wall,

ccvcc cv vcc cvcc cvcc cvc

32. heavy, earth-drawn, all mouth and eye,

cvcv vcc ccvc ' vc cvc vcc v

33. the sunflower, dreaming umber,

cv cvcccvcv ccvcvc vccv

IV
f-hjov* Pq 31o
34. catspiss^smelj)<r
cvcccvc ccvc

35. the pink bloom open;

cv cvcc ccvc vcc

312
313
48. blooms and pigments
ccvcc vcc cvccvccc
pA-evvi ?3 3(0
49. the back offyouj) hand ■V
cv cvc vc cvc cvcc

50. like a birthmark -

cvc v cvcccvcc
”| pA.ov-1 69 ±\3

51. (mp umber one, I----<_----

cv vccv vc

52. fj^are(^uned^teined) p |3|0

cw v
""""
ccvcc ccvcc
..................................................

53. to perfection,
cv cvcvccvc

Syllabic Structure and Lexical Repetition

314
Parts Stanza No. of syllables in each line
I I 11 12 7
(1) (2) (3)i i
i

n 7 11 10
(4) (5) (6)
Irt 9 11 11
(7) (8) (9)
IV 12 -
(10) (11) (1,2)
II Couplets 11 8 - 8 7
(I) (2) (3) (4) (5)
- 8 5 - 6
k
(6) (7) (8) (9) (10)
6 8; 7 8
(II)(12) (13) (14) (15)
5 6 6 8 11
(16) (17) (18) (19) (20)

Cont..

315
m i 4 7 9
(21) (22) (23)
ii 8 8 7
(24) (25) (26)
in 10 5 10 ,
(27) (28) (29) '
IV 7 7 8
(30) (31) (32) .;

v. 7 i
(33)
IV Lines 3 5 4 6 6
(20) (34) (35) (36) (37) (38)
5 5 4 ! 6 5
(39) (40) (41) (42) (43)
4 5 7 :3 4
(44) (45) .(46) (fil) (48)
i
5 4 4 4 4
(49) (50) (51) 052) (53)

Table No. 1

316
 t

It is a title poem published in the anthology in 1979. The poem

offers a delightful array of erotic moments and images. The

^ i

imperfection of the vaccination mark on his; wife’s thigh becomes a

mark of desire in ‘Field Work’. It is tranjsformed into a host of

natural images- a chestnut, a scar on a tree’s bar, a sunflower-

, j

utlimately giving way in the fourth poem! to an erotic ritual of

i

staining her hand with a leaf from a flowering current. What these

poems -variously suggest are the manifold ways in which the lover

can find embles of his desire in nature and thje delight to be found in

mature, erotic love. “This is a Heaney not seen before, not even in

the erotic homages to the female bog people for he expresses a

tenderness as well as a need thatj his highly ihasculine verse has not

heretofore acknowledged”.4
1 >
The poem is divided into four different chunks of unusal

visual pattern with an uneven number of lines varying in syllabic

length and stanza form. Part I is composed often long lines split into

three stanzas of three lines each followed by: a single line which is

foregrounded. Part II is in ten lines grouped into five couplets.

317
Part III runs into thirteen lines split into four stanzas of three lines

each followed by an isolated single line which is foregrounded as in

Part I Part IV is one large chunk of twenty short lines.

The whole poem lacks the end rhyme scheme in general.

However, the rhythm in the poem is on account of its metrical shape

and a number of sound devices used in it. The semantic level of the

poem is rather simple as there are 235 monosyllabic words which

predominate the whole poem.

i

The run-on‘lines in the peom are large in number. Obviously

indicating the grammatical overflow from one line to another.

The use of metrical foot varies from dimetre to pentametre. The

basic foot is in a way iambus but the trochees used are almost in

equal number, both creating opposite rhythms in the poem. Besides

the trocheic modulation pyrrhics and spondeqs modulate the poem to

a large extent.

The following examples illustrate the sound texture observed in the

poem: -

Alliteration: white wash whins (6)

weedy water (22) where was (3)

318
Assonance:

tree breeze (1) wagon : cattle (12)

t\:l HU /*/ 1*1
thick with (28) back hand (38,49)
frl fif M !f*l

Consonance appears in the following examples

k *

perfect^ watched (2) one furn^jgreeii (3)

■ standing watching (4) lift white (6)

comes goods (9) ' except; , not (13)

wounded^ dryad (14) btilliant^mast (19)

leaves cones (23) old whitened (25)

not^ tart (27) braced^ dashed (31)

and mould (45) like birthmark (50)

The dense foregrounding of above mentioned sound devices,

particularly the use of consonance creates jmusieality and rhythm in

the poem.

. The choice of diction such as tree' breeze, blackbird, fern,

green, whins, cattle, bark, moon, chestnuts, Atlantic Pacific waters,

weedy leaves, cow, winter, summer, butterflies, fungus, pebble,

earth, sunflower, creates a cohesive semantic structure of

319
relationship suggesting the nature imaginery used in the poem.

Heaney uses a variety of compound formations in almost all

the poems. (This poem uses the following compoundings.) When a

single word does not exist for a concept he wants to express, he

resorts to compoundings and collocations. His compoundings are

often syntactic compressions of modifying phrasal elements. By

compressing the syntax he can capture so many instantaneously

percieved effects.

big-eyed ring-wormed pock-marked

Adj. N + ed N N + ed N JV + ed
1 —1 l J l r1
M M ■ M

pebble-dashed earth-drawn criss-cross

N V + ed N + V + ed Adj.
l '-rJ i x~~rJ

M ■ M

leaf-coins leaf-veins

N N N N M
l___ 1 i 1
H H

The use of such compoundings as a foregrounding in the poem helps,

us to understand Heaney’s perception. The obvious effect is that of

320
comprehension of simultaneously percieved things.

Quite often in his vocabulary there is a metaphorical transfer

from one semantic field to another. It is his favourite use of the

device of synaesthesia which establishes the syntactic relations

between elements semantically incompatible denoting sensation

from different sensorial fields., Let us consider the following

illustrations which can be catagorised under the traditional labels ,

such as personification, animation, metaphor and simile-.

F Tree went pale (1)

Humanizing Metaphor
L The child went pale

F Moon was a coin (17-18)

Concretive Metaphor
•L Her face looked like a coin

F The sunflower dreaming umber (33)

L The human being dreaming umber

F Leaf veins (43)

Humanizing
L Human veins

Fungus plump as a leather saddle (29) (Simile)

V

321
 For Ann Saddlemyer

Our heartiest welcomer

(Glaninojre Sonnets)

Vowelsjplouglied iijlto otijer: opened ground

1.
X f \ * /J * xl* X / 1 * /
2, The miWest Fepruary for twejnty years
X / , / /iXX/lA/]/’/
3. Is mistjbands oyer furrow) a deep/no sound
/ X Xl X X [ X X | / x i / x
4. Vulnerable to)distant|gargling) tractors.
x / jx / i x x/ j/ /ix /
5. Our road is stemming, the tumed-Jup ac|res breathe.
/ x . / / , / X |X / iX /
6. Now the! good life) could be) to cross a field
X / , X ' fX X f X / I / X |X /
7. And artj a pai^digmf of earth) new frotif the lathe
X 1 I x MX / IX /
8. Of ploughs) My lea) is deeply tilled.

9. Old plough|socks gorge jdie subsoil ofjeacli sense

X XfX t . X , x IX f lx /
10. And I)am quickened with) a redolence
Of the) fundamental [dark ^lown rpse.
11.

12. Wait then. |. Breasting the mistj in sowers’/aprons,

X / ./ / , / /ix / | / x
13. My ghosts come strfdmg infto their spnng)stations.
X ! |f t i' ' | X ^|X /
14. The dream) gram whirls like freakish Easter snows.

Metrical Structure

322
 For Ann SaddLemyer

Our heartiest welcomer

(Glanmore Sonnets)

1. Vowelsfeloughed)into other: opened ground

cvcvcc ccvc VTvccv vcv vcvcc ccvcc

2. The mildest (February for twenty years

cv cvccvcc(cvccvcv cv ccvccvvc

3. Is (mist) bands/over furrow, a deep no sound

vccvccVcvccefvc cvcvcc vcvc cvcvcc

4. Vulnerable/to distant gargling tractors,

cvccvcvcc/ cv cvccvcc cvccvc ccvccvc

5. Our road/is steaming, the turned- up acres breathe,

vc cvc vc ccvcvc cv cvcc vc vcvc ccvc

6. Now the good life could be to cross a field

cv cv cvc cvc cvc cv cv ccvc v cvcc

7. And art a paradigm of earth new from the lathe

vcc vcvcvcvcvc vcvc cvc ccvc cv cvc

8. lea is deeply tilled.

cv\ cv vc cvccv cvcc ~Xa Pg 3 2.4

9. Old^iougliso^) gorge the subsoil of each sense

vcc ccvcvcc cvc cv cvccvc vcvc cvcc

10. And 1 am quickened with a redolence

vcc vvc cvcvcc cvc vcvcvcvcc

323
11. Of the fundamental dark unblown rose,
vccv cvccvcvccc cvc vcccvc cvc

12. Wait then.... Breasting the(misu in sowers’ aprons,

cvc cvc ccvccvc cv cvcc\vc cvcvc vccvcc fvioi'A fg 32
^——-------------

13. \My)gliosts come striding into their spring stations.

cvxcvccc cvc cccvcvc vccv cv cccvc CCVCVCC , £*>1 Ps 35

14. The dream grain whirls like freakish Easter snows,

cv ccvc ccvc cvcc cvcccvcvc vccv ccvc

Syllabic Structure and Lexical Repetition

324
Lines No. of syllables in each line

10 10 11 11

(1) (2) (3) (4)

10 10 10 8.

(5) (6) -(7) (8)

10 10 10 10

(9) (10) (H) (12)

11 10

(13) (14) ■

Table No. 2

325
 The ‘Glamnore Sonnets’ sequence is placed centrally in this

collection and shows Heaney’s most obvious attempt to locate

himself in the Wicklow landscape. He is also locating himself as a

writer in a specific literary tradition. The references to Wordworth

and Wyatt rather than Yeats, the choice of a sonnet sequence itself

suggests Heaney’s need to draw on the strengths of main stream

English literature. There is a sense of refreshment in nature and a

practical realization of Wordsworthian aesthetics as noticed in the

following lines:

Now the good life could be to cross a field

And art a paradigm of earth new from the lathe
Of plough. My lea is deeply tilled.

Poetry for him is an enactment of rural toil. ‘Vowels ploughed

into other, opened ground each verse returning like, the plough
turned round.’

As the plough returns to its starting point Heaney’s reiterating his

very first themes and images. He is still ‘digging’ with his pen. In

these sonnets the heightened moments are when Heaney’s language

matches the emotional pitch of his feelings.

326
 Heaney’s choice of the sonnet form indicates a desire to

re-establish the old values of order harmony and lyricism in his work

after the highly politisized and thrusting quatrains of North. The

sequence of sonnets appropriately begins with a dedication to his

‘patron’ at Glanmore, Ann Saddlerayer, the academic who had

leased the cottage to the couple. She is addressed as ‘our heartiest

welcomer’ a phrase, borrowed from Yeats ‘In Memory of Major

Robert Gregory’. In his new home Heaney prepares himself to

receive some of the ghosts of his past. In the opening line of first

sonnet “Heaney sets in the soil preparatory vowel sounds- ‘au’, ‘au’,

‘i/u’, ‘a7‘c?’, ‘du’/‘d’, ‘au’- graphic and aural circles in which he will

plant fecund images. The field he is about to plaugh is ‘deeply tilled’

and places the poet in a pastoral tradition reaching back through

Kavanagh to Horace and Virgil. The ‘Opened Ground’ he speaks of

takes us back to the furrows turned in ‘Follower’. Hie first sonnet

ends with the images conveying fertility, energy and continuity, a

succession of long vowels and a buoyant iambic confidence”.5

Now let u$ look at the sonnet closely and work out the

structure of language which helps the propositional meaning to

327
emerge. It is written in 14 lines in iambic pentameter.

32 polysyllabic words are foregrounded which creates some

complexity to’ the implied, content of the somiet. The majority of the

lines are end-stopped type (9) and fiverun-on type. The run-on lines

create a syntactic pull, thereby creating a tension between metrical

pause and syntactic pull resulting in enjambment. For example

The mildest February for twenty years ------>

------> Is mist bands.... no sound ------>
“ ^ Vulnerable to distant gargling tractors

Similar instances are noted in lines 7 and 8, 10 and 11, and 12

and 13. Alternate lines rhyme in the poem (1-12). The following

rhyming pairs shar e a common semantic field.

ground sound (1,3), field tilled (6, 8), years tractors (2,4)
7^/ 14x1 / i • I li’l izl \i\
Alliteration:

subsoil sense striking spring stations

Assonance:

good could unblown rose

hi hi fwi iwi
Consonance:

pi oughed^opened^^round bands furrows

good could field • sower’s aprons whirls snows

328
The basic rhythm is rising one which is modulated mainly by

troeheic falling rhythm and by strong spondees and swift pyrrliics.

The commulative effect of the metrical structure and the sound

devices used in die poem is that of music.

The syntactic patterns used in the poem are quite

straightforward helping the reader to move forward smoothly. The

poet narrates the poem in the first person in the present tense giving

tiie effect of authenticity as the poem has autobiographical reference

and the use of present tense suggests that the activities/themes

emerging from the poem are not very much time bound and can be

extended beyond particularity.

The following examples illustrate Heaney’s metaphoric use of

language:

F Vowels ploughed into other:

opened ground (line 1)

Concrctive Metaphor

L .The farmers ploughed the field

F Distant gargling tractors (4)

Humanizing Metaphor

L Distant gargling children

329
 F The turned up acres breathe (5) 1
l Humanizing Metaphor

L The turned up men breathe ^

F Old ploughsocks gorge the

subsoil of each sense (9)

1 l Animistic Metaphor

L Old ploughsocks gorge the u

subsoil of each field

1 ,,■* *

F The fundamental dark unbiowri

rose (11) H
i >■ Animistic Metaphor

L The fundamental dark plans

The dreaiii grain whirls like freakish Easter snows (14) (Simile)
T V
The lexis such as Plough, ground, mist, rose, tractors, road,

steaming, acres, field, earth, lathe, lea, tilled, ploughsocks, subsoil,

i,

\,

sowers, apron* spring, grain, easter, snows, Cohere in a manner which

suggests a tight lexical cohesion amounting to the register of

farming.

These ‘Glanmore Sonnets’ represent a particularly notable

step in Heaney’s poetic development considering “the violence done

to the English poetic line in Wintering Out and North here is the poet

330
of the half line and ringing alliteration, the stanza- as-

archeaological-instnunent, suddenly offering up the most

conventional form of lyric poem”.6 Heaney appears to have taken

considerable risk on his part while composing these sonnets as he

has never mastered iambic pentaraetre as we have already observed

in the metrical analysis of his poem so for worked out. He does not

appear to have been deeply influenced by Hopkins, Hughes and

Anglo-Saxon verse with regard to the completely regular line.

However, he transforms this ‘weakness’ in these sonnets into a

positive energy. The modern somiet takes greater liberties with

metrics and so does Heaney.. The construction of a somiet sequence

* i

such as these indicates Heaney’s relation to the tradition although

‘Glamnore Sonnets’ turned out to be an extremely literary exercise.

In the first one which we have analysed, the penaltimate line

My ghosts come striding into their spring stations

seems to anticipate the Station Island sequence six years later. As a

matter of fact the sequence is filled with his ghosts. “Part nature

poetry, part poetry of flight from the. Troubles, part metapoetry, part

331
love poetry, the ‘Glanmore Sonnets’ take all of the relevance equally

seriously. They affirm in a time that can require so many elegies, that

life is more than death, that there are places iof peace, that hate and

vengeance may not be the only possible ruling passions, that love

exists.”7

332
 GlanmoreSonnet

II
/ X t X X x ' X / X
1. Sensings, mountings from the hiding places,

Words e^eringjalmostjthe sense|of touch

2.
Ferreting themselves outjof theirjdark hujteh-
3.
{ X 1X X | / ^ ! )i / r x .x ,
4. ‘These thmgslare notisecrets but myjstenes,
x x . / >i / X}/ x •/
5. OisinlKelly/told rae/years ago
X X f r / Xf xr / AX/'
AX l
6. In Belfast/ hankering after stone
X X /■ fX X . / X JX X|X /
7. Tliat connived with the (chisel,j as if |the gram
*/l,XXjX/.X/ IX/
8. Remembered whatjthe mallet tapped [to know,
X X/.XXiX/ i/ Xf / i
9. Then I lanped in (the hedgefschool of/Glanmore
x x jx ^ ix /. x / | x t
10 And froirj the^back^ of ditches hoped to raise
x / i/ / »/ / i x . x / ]/ x
11 A voice caught backjoff slugj-horn and slowlchanter
X / ■ i/C / lx / 1 / X {X /
12 That might continue, hold/ dispel, appease.

Vowelsjploughed ijto otl|er, opened ground,

13
Each versej retuijning lik^j the ploughj turned round.
14

Metrical Structure

333
 II

1. Sensings, mountings from the hiding places,

cvccvcc cvccvcc ccvccv cvcvc cCvcvc
' I

2. Words entering almost the sense of touch

cvcc vccvcvc vccvcc cv cvcc vc cvc

3. Ferreting themselves out of their dark hutch-

cvcvcvc cvccvccvc vc vccv cvc cvc

4. ‘These tilings are not secrets but mysteries,’

cvc cvcc v cvc cvcvcc cvc cvccVcvc

5. Oisin Kelly told me years ago

vcvc cvcv cvcccv vc vcv j
i

i
6. hi Belfast, hankering after stone
vc cvccvcc cvccvcvc vcevccye
i ’

7. That connived with the chisel, as if the grain

cvc cvcvcc cvc cv cvcvc vcvccv ccvc

8. Remembered what the mallet tapped to: know,

cvcvccvc cvc cv cvcvc cvcc cv cv

9. Then I landed in thejiedge-school of Glanmore

cvc v cvccvc vc cv cvc ccvc vc ccvccv

10. And from the backs of ditches hoped to raise

vcc ccvc cv cvcc vccvcvc cvcc cvcvc

11. A voice caught back off slug-bom and slow chanter

v cvc cvc cvc vc ccvc cvc vcc ccv cvccv

12. That might continue, hold, dispel, appease:

cvc cvc cvccvccvcvcc cvccvc vcvc

334
13. Vowels(ploughea)into other, opened ground,
CVCVCG ccvc Vvccvvcv vcvcc ccvcc

14. Each verse returning like the( trnjned round,

vc cvc cvcvcvc cvc cv ccv cvcc cvcc

Syllabic Structure and Lexical Repetition

335
 Chunk No. of syllables in each line

10 10 10 10

(1) (2) (3) (4)

10 9 Hi 10

(5) (6) (7) (8)

11 10 U 9

(9) (10) (11) (12)

10 10
•

(13). (14)

Table No. 3

In these sonnets often Heaney’s language matches the

emotional pitch of his feelings. In this sonnet Heaney restates his

essentially religious Jungian view of the act of creation, a view first

articulated in ‘The Diviner’. The poet experiences intially strirrings

somewhere in the ‘Dark Hutch’ of the sub conscious, ‘sensings’

which seek a shape, a form, achieve an incarnation in words. He

suggests that an impenetrable mystery or conspiracy almost, lies

behind the creation of any work of art. The stone connives with the

336
chisel the wood-grain instructs the mallet. Heaney now being in the

hedge-school of Glanmore prays that his humble surroundings will

tutor him in song, provide him with a peotic instrument that might

‘continue, hold, dispel, appease’ his epiphonies and fear.

»

The present sonnet runs into 14 lines without any further

subdivisons of lines into stanzas. However, there appears to be two

broad units of meaning-1-12 lines as one unit followed by the last 2

lines as another unit of meaning though complementary. Almost all

i
die lines are 10 syllabic in pentametre with a ;minor variation of 9

and 11 syllables in few lines. Heaney does not seem to bother about

die use of end rhyme scheme as in conventional sonnet form but uses

a few good end-rhyming words connected by a common semantic

thread. For example,

touch" huteii (lines 2-3) ground round (13-14)
/A/ /M ■ mil libil
. There are 33 polysyllabic words and 65 ’monosyllabic words

and the polysyllabic lexical foregrounding adds to the semantic

i

complexity of the poem.

The metrical shape of the poem ’ is quite irregular as die

distribution of various feet across the poem is very much uneven.

337
However, the basic measure as in other poems happens to be the

rising one with occasional modulations created by trochees, pyrrhies

and spondees.

Out of 14 lines 7 lines are run-on and remaining ones

end-stopped type. The syntax by and , large appears to be

straightforward. Lines 1, 2 and 3 illustrate syntactic inversion which

topicalise phrases in line no. 1. The poet u^es direct speech in line

no. 4 and from line 5-12 constitute a long complex sentence cut into
i
t ' i

several phrases/clauses to suit the requirements of the sonnet form.

The last two lines form one sentence. •

The whole poem is a huge metaphqr which explains the poetic

process of communication through language particularly through

carefully chosen words.

Alliteration is noticed in
^lug'^showjll) themselves there (3)

Assonance establishes the links betweeiii the following words

plough round (14) ploughed ground (13)

f^l /TIM / / Anf

338
 Consonance is noticed in the following examples

sensings mountings places (1) these things mysteries (4)

not^buj: (4) what^mallet^t^ped (8) tha^mighj: (12)

ploughed opened ground (13) turned round (14)

Heaney’s use of metaphors/similies is noticed in the following

examples.

F words entering almost the sense of

touch (2)
“ Syiiaesthetic Metaphor

L people entering, almost in the house

F (Words) ferreting themselves out of

their dark'hutch (3) j

! Aniinlslic Metaphor

L Animals ferreting themselves out of

the cave

F as if the grain/Remebered what the

mallet tapped to know (6,7, 8)

" Humanizing Metaphor
L as if the farmer remembered the

whole past

339
F Vowels ploughed into other,

opened ground (13) ^j" Concrctive Metaphor

i

L The formen ploughed in th£ farm/field

i

F Each verse returning like the

i

plough turned round (14) i

fr ,
' Animistic Mclaphor
L Each horse returning from the stable

340
 x

Station Island

x / j x * i/ /
1. A hurry of(bell-notes

2. flew oj/er moaning hush

a nx / i* X | x /
3. and wsfter- blistered (cornfields,
fit/.)'/
4. an escaped/nnging
t stoppedjias quickly
5.

XX// x . / X
6. as it parted. (Sunday,

X 6 x / •
7. the silence breathed
X x IX / J X /
8. and could/not settle back
x x / ix x /
9. for a man had appeared
X' x / \ X X /
10. at the sidejof the field

x x / ,/ /
11. with a bow+saw, held
t x x, * * /
12. that
stiffly up/like a lyre.
13. He moved|and stopped]to gaze

x X. X /,X / , x
14. Up iipo hajzel bushes.
x X x i./ x
15. angled liislsaw in,

341
 pulled baclj; to gaze| again
16,
X / IX x f x /
17. and movy on tojthe next.
* t \ * f I x /
18. ‘I know) you, Sipon Sweeney,
x x / I x / i/ x
19. for an old/Sabbath-foreaker

20. who has been dead for years.’

X /
21. ‘Damn alljyou know^’ he said,
A / I A X |X /
22. his eye still on the hedge

23. and {K)t|turmng)his head.

* X \ * f IX X f
24. I wasjyour mystery man
x * /. ]./. / jX
25. and am again! this morning

26. Through gap^ in the) bushes,

x First|C(omm^nion face
27. your
would watchjme cutting tinjber.
28.
/ / IX / ? X. /
29. When cut or brcjken limbs
X / / JX X
30. of treesjwent yellow, when

31.

32.

342
 X / j X / . t
33. you senses my trail [there
X *\' fi I x /
34. as iflit had/been sprayed.
x / /X / jx /
35. It left/y ou half afraid.

36. ■ When the/bade yoij/listen

* x / ./ /
37. in the bedroom dark
X / i* / |X x /
38. to windland rain/in the trees
39. and thin/ of tinkjsrs camped
( x |X f IX /
40. under|a heelediup cart

41. you shuj/ /our eyes] and saw

X / i/ x| x /
42. a wet axle and spokes
43. m moor|[ight, andjme

44. streaming] i-om the jshower,

45. headed for]your door. ’

! / |/ x X j/ X
46. Sunlight/broke in the/hazels,
X / 1/ / *X /
47. the quick/bell-notes/began
X /| X / *1 x /
48. a second time/1 turned

49. at another sound:

343
 ft / I X t ./ X
50. a crowd of shawled women

X / , X x J / /
51. were waning the |young com,
x r
52. their skirt:

53. Their mciion saddened mc^inng

ft l i j X.X . /|X
54. It whispered to/the silence,
t ft \t r ,ft t
55. ‘Pray for/us, praylfor us,’

ft f 1 ft ft' A x /
56. it conjured through the air
/XIX f IX !
57. untiljthe field]was full

X / »x / f x Ax
58. oflialf-j remenjbered faps,
X f ) r ft \ I ft
59. a loosed/congrdgation

struggled pasj and on.

60. tliat stra

xx/ jx / j*
61. As I drew behind Ahem
62. 1 was) a fashed pilgrim,

63. Light-headed, leajving home

^ x i I./ x X j / .X
64. to face/ mto my (station.
\X ' X / 1 .X
65. Stay cleaij of all processions:

' X | (ft x /
66. Sweeney shouted at me

344
 X X / IX Xl* /
67. but the murmur off the crowd

68. and their feet^slushing through

69. the terrier, blajied growth

/ x IX / ft /
70. opened/a drugged path

X x
/' * / IX /
71. I was set/upon.
x / /X f r x //x
12. I trailed/ those early-risers
* . * /ix /IX/
73. Who had fa^en inp step
x / x / x /
74. before the smokes were up.
* t j f / ,x /
75. The quickJbell rang agaiin.

Metrical Structure

345
 Station Island

I
1. A hurry of^e^-notes _____ To fe
v cvcv vc cvc cvcc--
2. flew ovei<morning)hush To ?3 3 so
cccvvcv cvcvc cvc

3. and water- blistered cornfields,

vcc cvcv ccvccvc cvccvccc

4. an escaped ringing
vcvccvcc cvcvc

5. that stopped as quickly

cvc ccvcc vc ccvccv

6. as it started. Sunday,
vcvcccvcvc cvccv

7. the(gdericg^breathed______ T* p5 ,3-go_____
CV CVCVCC C9VCC

8. and could not settle back

vcc cvc. cvccvcc cvc

9. for a(man^liad appeared_____ To fj 54^

cv vcvc cvcvcvc

10. at die side of the field

vc cv cvc vc cv cvcc

11. with a bow-saw, held

cvc v cv cv cvcc.

346
12. stiffly up like a lyre,
ccvccvvc cvcvcw

13. unmoved and stopped to

/cv cvcc vcc ccvcc cv eve

14. Up intoxhazel
vc veev cvcvc cvcvc

15. angled(£s^:
vccc eve cv vc

16. pulled back to tgaze)agam

cvcc eve cv eve veve

17. and move onto the next,

vcc eve vc cv cv cvccc To Pg 343
3s*o, 3sr|
18. [know you, Simon(SweeneyX
cv) cv cvcvc ccvcv
vcv V To Pg 5SI

19. for an old Sabbath-breaker

cv vc vcc cvcvc ccvcv

20. wha has been dead for years.’

cv I eve eve eve cv vc

21. ‘Damn ail you know/^j^ said,.

eve vc cv cv cv eve

22. (hi§) eye still on the hedge

cvc v ccvcvccv eve

23. ana not tuming(hisfr head.

vcy eve cvcvc eve eve
fiww. f3 34C
24. (^l)was(yoiro mysterjKmarj)- -<r
v eve cvc\cvccvcv eve TO Pg 34^
 , - xi ■ pAovw. |W<2_ 3^46
25. and am again this(moming)-<——--------- —L—__!_
vccvc vcvc cvc cvcvc
P'ujvw. 34*
26. Through gaps in theQjushes)-^
ccv cvccvccv cvcvc

27. your First Communion(face)----- ——^ 3-f------?

cv cvcc ctocvcvc cvc

28. would watch me(cuttinj^timber.

cvc cvc cv/cvcvc cvccv

29. When@)or broken limbs

cvc cvcv ccvcvccvccc
_____________________To ?s 343___________
30. ofCtreejwent yellow, when
vcccvc cvcc cvcv cvc

31. woodsmoke sharpened air

cvcccvc cvcvcc v

32. or ditches rustled

v cvcvc cvccc ~

33. (you) sensed my trail there

cv cvcc cv ccvccv

34. \ as if it had been sprayed,

v vc vc vc cvc cvc cccvc To

35. It left (youjhalf afraid,

vc cvcc‘cvvcvc vccvc

36. When they bade(yoy) listen

cvc cv cvc cv cvcc

348
37. in the bedroom dark
vccv cvccvc cvc

38. to wind and rain in the(trees>4—

cvcvce vcccvc vccv ccvc

39. and think of tinkers camped

vcccvcc vc cvccvc cvccc

40. under a heeled-up cart

vccv v cvcc vc cvc fg 348
41. (ym^shuKjoi^) eyes and saw
cv cvc cvc\vc vcc cv

42. a wet axle and spokes

v cvc vccc vcc ccvcc

43. in moonlight, and me

vc cvccvc vcc cv Paoi34^

44. streaming from the shower,

cccvcvc; ccvccv cvcv
"i1 >

45. headedfoi(youj)door.5
cvcvc cv cvc cvc
$5 34 4
46. Sunlight broke in thdmazels^
cvccvc ccvc vc cv cvcvcc
. 1 34k
47. the quickvbelg-notes began -4
cv ccvc cvc cvcc cvcvc
Pf) 344
48. a second timedlturnfid- -f-
v cvcvcc cvc v cvcvcc

49. at another sound:

vcvcvcv cvcc

349
50. a crowd of shawled women
v ccvc vc cvcc cvcvc

51. were wading the young com, ,

CV CVCVC CV CVC CVC To fjs 3" 57

' 52. hheip skirts bmshing softly.

[CV CCVCCCCVCVC cvcccv
f/ufwt Pg 346
53. \Xheipmotion saddened (morning)—^
cv cvcvc cvcvcc cvcvc

54. It whispered to tlie{silence^)- I Faoyvf fcj -34^

vccvccvc cvcv cvcvcc

55. (Pray)for us,(pray)for us,’

ccv cv vc ccv cvvc

56. it conjured through the air

vccvcccvc ccv cv v

57. until the field was Ml

vccvccv cvcc cvc cvc

58. of half- remembered (fjtces)- -4-

vccvc cvcvccvc cvcvc

59. a loosed congregation

v cvcc cvcccvcvcvc

60. that straggled past and on.

cvc cccvcvcc cvcc vcc vc

61. As0drew behind them

vcvcccv cvcvcc cvc

350
62. Q)was a fasted pilgrim, R3-ovv*- Pg ~5 41*

v cvc v cvccvc cvcccvc

63. Light-lieaded, leaving home

cvc cvcvc cvcvc cvc

64. to (faceinto my station. Fas'** i‘*3 34*%

-Jv
cvcvc vccvcv ccvcvc

65. ‘Stay clear of all processions:’

CCV CCV VC VC CCVCVCVCC fiat*. P3 7-4^-
............. .................... ......■(............ . '
66. (Sweeney)shouted at me
ccvcv cvcvc vc cv

67. but the murmur of the crowd

cvccv cvcv vccv ccvc *v\ P«£Jfl_

68. andjthen^feet slushing through

vcc cv cvc ccvcvc ccv

69. the tender, bladed growth

cv cvccv ccvcvc ccvc

70. opened a drugged path

vcvcc v ccvcvc cvc

..(F
71. IX) was set upon,
vcvc cvcvcvc
-<C
72. (^trailedthose early-r
-risers
vccvcc cvc vcv cvcvc

73. Wlio had fallen into step

cv cvc cvcc vccv ccvc

74. before the smokes were up.

cvcv cv ccvcc cv vc

351
75. The quick(Q)rang again. 34^
cv cvc- cvccvc vcvc

Syllabic Structure and Lexical Repetition

352
 Stanza- No. of syllables in each line
I 6 6 7 5 5
(1) (2) (3) (4) (5)
n 6 4 5 6 6
(6) (7) (8) (9) (10)
III 5 6 6 1: 5
(11) (12) (13) (14) (15)
IV ~6 6 7 ' 1. 6
(I6)(17)(18)(lf>)(20)
V 6 6 6 7 6
(21) (22) (23) (2i|) (25) i

VI 6 6 7 6 l
6
(26) (27) (28).(2j>) (30)
1

vn 5 5 .6 7! 6
(31) (32) (33) (34) (35)

I
vm 6 5 7 7| ' 7
(36) (37) (38) (3^) (40)

IX 665.6 5
(41) (42) (43) (44) (45)
1 X ~1 6 6 ? 7
(46) (47) (48) (49) (50)

Cont..

353
XI 6 6 7 8 6
(51) (52) (53) (54) (55)
xii 7 6 8 7 6
(56) (57) (58) (59) (60)
xni 6 7 6 7 7
(61) (62) (63) (64) (65)
XIV 6 7 6 6 6
(66) (67) (68) (69) (70)
i
XV 5 8 7 6 6
(71)(72)(73);(7i)(75) •

Table No. 4

354
 What one gets from Heaney’s Dante, in the ‘Station Island’

sequence as from his Bog people is a new structure for complex

experience of childhood and adolescent recall, an ironic religious

i

sense and a deep political unease. “The new world is rich in images,

bright, witty, tender and rueful and in ■ ways that are entirely

expressive of Heaney not Dante. Dante seems to provide a form

which is conveniently occupied, rather thaln a meeting place which

o

provokes fresh, imaginative utterence.’

The poem takes it as a basic conceit from the tradition of

pilgrimage literature associated with an island in Lough Derg in

County Donegal. The island itself has strong associations with Saint
* [

Patrick, and the pilgrimage involved a tlirep day stay, during which
' ■ i

time the pilgrim fasts and prays in addition; to completing, bare foot
i

!i:* i
nine circuits of the Island. A number of'Iijish authors have written

about the pilgrimage experience and Heaney fits his own narrative

within that narrative tradition.

In ‘Station Island’ Heaney comes face to face with the

ideology of his community and reassesses his own position in

relation to them. The poem is structured as a series of encounters

355
with the ghosts of dead figures who are either known to Heaney
*

personally or have been important to him1 as a writer. The first two

encounters take place before the poet arises on the island itself and

the final encounter also occurs on the maijn land as he steps off the

boat returning him from the island.

In the first of the encounters, the ipoet comes upon an old

i
i
i

County Derry neighbour, Simon Sweeney Who had troubled Heaney ,

as a child and who returns now to disturb him again. Sweeney

appears in the poet’s childhood as transgressive figure upon whom

the child projects his fears of the alien and the unknown as stated in

the lines:

When they bade you listen

in the bedroom dark
to wind and rain in the trees
and think of tinkers camped
under a heeled-up cart
you shut your eyes and saw
a wet axle and spokes
in moonlight, and me
streaming from the shower,
headed for your door. ’ (Lines 36-45)

356
 The specific nature of Sweeney’s deviance which marks him

as an alien and transgressive presence, is registered by the poet when

he first recognizes his old neighbour. T know you Simon Sweeney’

die poet says, ‘for an old Sabbath breaker/who lias been dead for

years (lines 18,19, 20). Sweeney stands outside community because

he transgresses its Christian injuction against working on

Sunday- the Sabbath Day traditionaly dedicated to rest and religious

contemplation. Sweeney’s response to the poet’s remembered piety

1 ‘ \

has a double force to it as he tells die' poet “Damn all you know”.

(line 21) On the one hand. Sweeney is condemuing Heaney, for his

presumptuousness indicating that in his uniformed ignorance he

knows nothing. He also condemns poet’s knowledge and the

traditional pieties which he has accepted on faith for so many years.

“What Dante seems to provide for the ‘Station Island’ section

is a model for a long poem, fragmented but sequential, dislocated,

but progressive, elastic but sharped, narrative and lyrical, like the

form of ‘The Waste Land’. Eliot’s poem is more reticent than Station

Island compressing myth and narration and using discontinuity to

permit and press out moments of sequestered feeling. Heaney’s way

357
is to reduce the mythological elements, to employ it structurally

rather than narratively.”9

This title poem was published in 1984. This is the first section

of the Station Island sequence containing 15 stanzas of five short'

lines each. The syllabic length of the poem yaries from 5-7, average

line being of 6 syllables. About 93 polysyllabic words are

foregrounded which has obivously created semantic complexity in

the poem. Its metrical analysis idicates that by and large it is

composed in iambic trimetre. The monotony of die rising basic

rhythm is repeatedly broken by a large number of trocheic rhythm

and a good number of swift pyrrhics and strong spondees. The poem

lacks end rhyme scheme as such.-However, the following sound

devices have created music and also added to the total rhythm of, the

poem.

Alliteration connects the following w;ords:

started Sunday (6) like lyre stifny(12)

simon sweeney (18) his head (23) mystery man (24)

i ien(30) moonlight me (43)

358
 light leaving (63) headed home (63)

Consonance:

and blistered (3) had appeared (9) side field (10)

—------- Vs^----------------------------------------------------------- '

rnovetl^ and (13) has^years(2Q) had spread (34)

wind^ and (38) second^ turned (48) crowd^shawled (50)

There is only one instance of assonance

they bade (36)

/' fzil
The following examples illustrate onomatopoeia

rustle (32), hush (2), feet slushing through (68)

the murmur of the crowd (67)

The following words occur more than once in the poem and intensify

the meaning to some extent:

morning silence field moved gaze hazel bushes

sweeney cutting air trail quick bell crowd faces

The use of such devices across the poem helps the reader to get into

die poem paradigmatically and syntagraatically in order to develop

the appropriate meaning structure. .

 As usual Heaney uses a few compoundings as listed below:

bell - notes water - blistered

N + N N + N + ed
t____ i \ ^ •
H M

bow - saw sabbath - breaker

N + N N- • N
\____ i 1 • J
H H

healed - up cart half - remembered

i1 faces

V + ed PrepN Adj...1|N + ei ' N

' \l t—r-1 ■

‘ M H ' M H

light - headed pilgrim1

N N + ed N
1______^ , . .
M • H ■:
i

The syntactic pattern of the poem is quite interesting as it is a

mixture of narrative and direct speech. The -first sentence begins at

line no. 1 and ends up in the middle of line no. 6 overflowing the
i «*

second stanza. The second sentence begins.in the middle of line no. 6
’ i

with an Advt. topicalized and goes upto line no. 12 crossing the

stanza boundry. The next one begins at line no; 13 arid moves on to

360
line no. 17 in tlie next stanza. This is followed by a direct speech

continued upto the end of line no. 20. The dialogue continues and the

next sentence ends at the line no. 25. It is followed by line 26 ending

in line 28. The next one begins at 29 and goes upto 34 which is an

example of long tailed predicate. Line no. 35 is a self contained short

sentence which appears to have been nicely foregrounded. The next

sentence runs over the following two stanzas (lines 36-45). The next

sentence runs from 46 to the middle of 48. A short sentence again

follows this and it is followed by another long sentence from 50-52.

The next line is a complete short sentence! at 53. This is followed by

direct speech at line no. 55 in which the phrase Tray for us’ repeats

twice. 56-60 from one sentence which again illustrates a long tailed

complex sentence. The next one is from line 61-64 followed by

direct speech of an exclamatory sentence within quotes which is

foregrounded. The last but one sentence overspills the stanza from

line 66-71 and the one before die last sentence is from 72-74 and the

poem ends with a simple sentence at line no. 75, which happens to

be another foregrounded line. The poem is nanated in the first

person. However, it switches over to the reported speech

361
occasionally and gets back to the first person narrative again.

Heaney uses a variety of metaphors and similes in the poem in

order to further clarify the propositional content of the poem.

F A hurry of bell notes/Flew over

morning hush
► Animistic

L A hurry of Sheep enabled them to

reach the river.

F The silence breathed/And could

not settle back (7,8)

► Humanistic

L The man breathed to come to life.

F woodsmoke sharpened air/Or

ditches rustle (31,32)

► Concrclive

L The wood cutter sharpened the axe. '

F Their motion saddened moming/It

whispered to the silence (53, 54) .

>- Humanistic
L Their motion saddened people/She

whispered to her friend

The use of words such as mominng hush, water, blistered

cornfields, field, lyre hazel bushes hedge, morning timber, trees,

362
woodsmoke, air ditches, rustled, rain, tinkers, cart, moonlight,

shower, sunlight, com, used across the poem create nature imagery

and a very tight lexical cohesion.

363
 The First Flight

1. It was morejsleepwalk) than spasm

x X |X Xf f x iX /
2. yet that/was a/time when/the times
X /iA .XI /
3. were ajfso m/spasm-

X /.XX / i / x- f X
4. the ties and the knots/riuimnglthrough
r /
5. split open
t . XI/ X ] X /
6. down tip lmes of|the grain..

xx#/ / ./(-/ ix I / a
7. As Iprew close to pebbles andjberries,

the smellj of wild Jgarlic, (relearning

8.
X x /1 X x. /
9. the acoustic of frost

10. and thejmeanmg ofjwoodnote,

X 7 | X /jx X /
11. my shadow over the field
X /, X Xi / *
12. was only a jspin-off,

13. my emjpty p/acej mi excuse

l r% x f / x / x
14. for shifts in the camp, old rehearsals

15. of debtsland bejtayal,

364
 / x * | / x ix f
16. Singly they| came to |the tree
, Jf., x / I* / , i /
17. with a stone m each/pocket
x / |x ' IX /
18. to whistle) and bill/me backj m

X X X( i x If x
19. and I (would ccfllide and cascade
x r |^ x t
20. through leaves/when they left,
21. my pomj of repose knocked) askew.

22.
f X X |X ; ]X / ,x X
23. Until they|beganlto pronounce me
x 11> x M* 1
24. a feeper on battlefields

25. so I tnasteredjnew rung^ of the air

X ^ / 1 *. ^ / ,
26. to survey out of reach
X / X * / X | / X
27. their bon Gres on hills, thein hosting

28. and fasting, the)leviesirom jscotland

29. as always, and) the peojple of art

X / | x J* ^ I / x /
30. diverting their rhythmical chants

365
31. to fend off the onslaught of winds
* X / | y * /
32. I would welcome and climb
* * f \7< K /
33. at the top) of my bent.

Metrical Structure

366
 The First Flight

1. It was more sleepwalk than(spasn:

vc cvc cv ccvccvc cvc/ccvcc

CVCCVC CVC V cvc cvc/ cv cvcvc .

3. were also in (spasm/

cv vccv vc ccvcc

4. the ties and the knots running through us

cv cvcvcccv cvcc cvcvc ccv ' vc

5. split open
cccvc vcvc

6. down the lines of the grain.

cvc cv cvcc vccv ccvc _io 368^ 20

7. Andrew close to pebbles and berries,

vc v cccv ccvc cv cvccc vcc cvcvc I

8. the smell of wild garlic, relearning

cv ccvc vc cvcc cvcvc cvcvcvc

9. - the acoustic of frost

cv vcvccvc vc ccvcc

10. and the meaning of woodhote,

vcc cv cvcvc vc cvccvc
______________________ To ?3 368,. 30

11. (mjshadow over the field

cv cvcv vcv cv cvcc

12. was only a spin-off,

cvc vccv v ccvc vc

367
13. (myfempty place ail excuse Ffarv*. P^e_
cv vcccv ccvc vcvccccvc 36 ^

14. for shifts in the camp, old rehearsals

cv cvcccvccv cvcc vcccvcvccvcc

15. of debts and betrayal,

vc cvcc vcccvccvcvc

16. Singly they came to the tree

cvcccvcvc cvc cvcv ccv

17. with a stone in each pocket

cvc vccvc vc vc cvcvc

18. to whistle and bill me back in

cvcvec vcccvccv cvc vc

19. ancffflwoiild collide and cascade

/WC V cvc cvcvc vcc cvcc

20 through leaves when1

ccv cvcvc cvc cv cvcc
......... —— ,i-1 — "

21 (m^ point of repose knocked askew

cv cvcc vc cvcvc cvcc vcccv

22. Q) was mired in attachment

Iv cvc cvvc vcvcvccvcc

23. | Until (the^) began to pronounce me

vccvc cv cvcvc cv ccvcvcc cv Pj SS-f

a feeder off battlefields

vcvcv vc cvcccvccc

25. so® mastered new rungs of the air

cvvcvccvc ccv cvcc vccv v

368
26. to survey out of reach
cvcvccv vc vccvc

27. Uheir)bonfires on hillsltheiphostmg

cv cvccvc vc cvcccv cvccvc

28. and fasting, the levies from Scotland

vcc cvccvc cv cvcvc ccvc ccvccvcc

29. \ as always, and the people of art

\yc vccvc vcc cv cvcc vcvc

30. diverting(pieir)rhythmical chants

cvcvcVc cv cvccvcc cvccc

31. to fend off the onslaught of winds

cvcvccvccv vcccvc vc cvccc , Pa**- fg
<—■------ —-
32. U) would welcome and climb
v cvc cvcvc vcc ccvcc ■ Pg 36“^

33. at the top of (my bent,

vc cv cvc vc cv cvcc

Syllabic Structure and Lexical Repetition

369
Stanza No. of syllables of each line
I 7 8 6
(1) (2) (3)
n 9 3 6
(4) (5) (6)
UI 10 9 6
(7) (8) (9) ■
IV 7 7 6
(10) (11) (12)
V 7 9 6
(13) (14) (15)
VI 7 7, 8,
(16) (17) (18)
VII 8 5,8.
(19)(20) (21)
vm 7 9 7
(22) (23) (24)
s

IX 9 6 8
(25) (26) (27)
X 9 9 8
(28) (29) (30)
XI. 8 6 6
(31) (32) (33)

Table No. 5

370
 The poem is taken from the Station Island published in 1984.

It tells of mastery and defiance, of climbing mire of ‘attachment’. It

is composed in 33 lines of uneven syllabic length grouped into

11 stanzas of three lines each. The foregrounding of polysyllabic

words is significant. The poem is rather simple for comprehension

but it demands on the part of the reader some knowledge of its

background. The poem does not seem to follow any regular rhyme

scheme in it.

Its metrical pattern is not very regular one and we notice a

kind of carefree treatment given to it by Heaney. Though the basic

foot is iambus we notice a large number of anapaests used together

creating a rising rhythm in the poem. We come across a considerable

t'

number of trochees used for the modulation besides the use of

pyrrhics and spondees.

Alliteration connects the following words meanigfully:

sleepwalk spasm (1) times^times (2)

bin black (18) collide Cascade (19)

leaves left (20) would welcome (32)

371
 Assonance is noticed the following examples:

time times (2) when left (20)

/*,'/ /4r7 ft I fe[
Consonance is observed in the following examples:

down^^^grain (6) close^ pebbles^berries (7)

shadow field (11), collide^ cascade (19)

whistle^ bill (18) pointy knocked (21)

at^ bent (33)

The sound devices listed above add to the rhythm and musicality of

Hie poem.
t

The syntactic patterns used in the .poem are a unique type of

foregrounding. It’s a first person narrative. The first sentence begins

at line no. 1 and moves on to line no. 6 overflowing the second

stanza. The second sentence begins at line no. 7 and moves on to the

end of line 15. The third sentence begins at line no. 16 with a fronted

Advm (singly) and ends at line no. 21. The fourth and the last

sentence begins at line no. 24 and moves on to the end of the poem

(line 33). These four complex Sentences with regular normal clausal

pattern have been cut into 33 lines to form a poem. The sentences are

separated by punctuation markers such as they begin with

372
capitalization and end up with a full-stop. Heaney has not so much

bothered about the end rhyme scheme in the poem. The first person

narrative techniques used in the poem possibly suggests its implicit

autobiographical concerns.

Heaney, as usual, makes use of metaphoric language as

demonstrated in the following illustrations:

F The times/were also in

spasm (lines 2-3)

- Humanizing Metaphor

L The muscles in the athelet’s

leg went into spasm

F The ties and knots running

through us /Split open/

Humanizing Metaphor

L The ties and knots are difficult to untie

F The acoustic of frost (9)

Animistic Metaphor
L The acoustic of the hall

F I was mired in attachment (22)

Humanizing Metaphor
L I was mired when l fell into the ditch

F To fend off the onslaught of winds (31)-

Concrclivc Metaphor
L onslaught of cattle

373
 The Haw Lantern
X y J !*-/]* * ofsealon,
1. The ha\y is bulling
nip out
/ XX)/ X// / IX / f/X
2. crab of the/thom, admail light for small? people,
/ X|/ / )X X I X X i / /
3. wantingjno more) from them) but thaf they keep
X / ]X / I x / 1* r r /
4. the wick) of self-respect) from dyipg out,
/ /)X x)/ X 'iX xlxxvx
5. not having toplind them (with illumination.

* /ix /.ix / ]/ ; xi x /
6. But son^times when/your breath/plumes
nes in the frost
it takes) &e roasting siafjel.X /f: x * •
of Dicjgenes
X . X / } / t X X 1 7 /
8. with his lantern, seeking one/just man;1
X f |X / / / * X fx . x, / lx }
9. so you) end up)scrutmized)from behind)the haw
X /•)/ X f / //XX (x /’
10. he holdsmp at feye-leyel on/its twig,.
XX 7 I x / )/ / /led pithjand stone,
1J. and you flincly before) its bon
x blood-prick
12. its ' -I'. - that
■? you)wish
/ 1/.- wbulcj
* .]/' X jblear
test and 1/ you
A-
ijble
}X /|X ^ / / , x * t /t X
13. its peek©a at ripeness that scans you, then/moves on.

Metrical Structure

374
 The Haw Lantern

1. The wintry(haw) is burning out of season,

cv cvcccv cvVvc cvcvc vc vccvcc

2. crab of the thorn a(smalf)light foi(small) people,

ccvcvccv cvc vccvc cvc cv ccvc cvcc

wanting lio more/from but that;, they keep

cvccvc cv cv \ccvc cvc cvccv cvc

4. the wick of self- respechfrom dying out

cv cvc vc cvcc cvcc vcc (ccvc cvc vc

not having to blind (flier with illumination,

cvc cvcvc cvccvcccvcl eye vccvcvcvcvc

6. But sometimes when yourlbreath plumes in the frost

cvccvccvcvc cvc cv beve cccvccvccv ccvcc

7. it takes the roaming shape ]of Diogenes

vccvcc cv cvcvc cvc (vccvcvevc

8. with his lantern, seeking one just\man;

cvc cvc cvccvc cvcvc cvc cvcc cvc'

9. so|vou)end up scrutinized from behind tli^haw)

xv cv vcc vc cccvcvcvcc ccvc cvcvcc cv cv
10. [ he holds up at eye-level on its twig,
xv cvccc vc vc v cvcvc yc vcc ccvc

11. and(you) flinch before its bonded pith and stone,

vcc cvxccvcc cvev vcc cvccvc cvc vcc ccvc
12. its blood-prick that(yoij) wish would test and clearfyou)
vcc ccvc ccvc cvc cv\cvc cvc cvcc vcc ccv/cv
13. its pecked at ripeness that scans^^then moves on.
vcc cvcc vc cvcvcvc cvc ccvcc cv cvc cvcc vc

Syllabic Structure and Lecxical Repetition

375
 Chunks No. of syllables in each line

I 11 11 10 9 12

(1) (2) (3) (4) (5) '

II 10 10 9 12 10 11 11 11

(6) (7) (8) (9) (10) (11) (12) (13)

Table No. 6

Heaney continues to be a poet rich in the use of tacticle

language while expressing emptiness, absence and distnace. This is a

title poem published in 1987. This poem dwells on a single

allegrocial image throughout and displays a relatively new maimer in

Heaney’s work. In his earlier poetry his imagery has been prolific.

We can see such a prolific use in his North (1975). Henaey so far

went on rippling with regard to his images and did not go deeper. In

this poem he goes deeper and fires on the one burning spot in the

blank landscape of winter- the red berry or haw on the naked

376
hawthorn branch. At first Heaney sees the berry as an almost

apologetic flame, indirectly suggesting his own quelled hopes as a

spokesman. He goes deeper into self quest by transforming the haw

into the lantern carried by Diogenes, searching for the one just man.

The stoic haw, meditation reminds the poet, is both pith and pit, at

once fleshy and stony. The birds peck at it but it continues ripening.

In this “upside-down almost-sonnet the stem haw lantern scrutinises

the poet scrutinising it”.10

Like other poems, in this volume this poem reflects a new

despair of country and of self. Forsaking topical reference Heaney,

writing in such genres as the emblem poem such as this, keeps

himself at a distance from daily events. Such analytic generalised

poetry aims at gaining in intelligence which it loses immediacy of

renference.

The poem is written in 13 lines of uneven syllabic length. It is

divided into two chunks of five lines and eight lines respectively.

The average syllabic length of the poem is ten syllables and it varies

from 9-12 syllables. The monosyllabic words out-number the

polysyllabic ones to a large extent. It creates some kind of simplicity

377
on the level of comprehension to some extent when the poem is read

in a linear manner. However, its vertical meaning is deeper and can

be located by paying attention to the close-knit hnaginery which

becomes emblematic. The poet does not seem to follow any

particular end rhyme scheme required of a sonnet though this poem

can be described a sort of ‘upside down’ sonnet with regard to its

formal structure.

The poemi is written in iambic pentametre with occasional

modulations of mainly trochees and pyrrhics and sometimes of

dactyls and spondees which break the monotony of the rhythm. We

do not come across a dense foregrounding of sounds as can be seen

from the examples given below:

Alliteration:
he holds (10) wish~would (12)

Consonance:

people small (2)^-but that (3) respect out (4)

sometimes plumes (6) but frost (6)

lantern one man (8) end behind (9)

is^jnove^>

378
Assonance:

takes shape (7) flinch its pith (11)

fell fell _ /if l'if [f|

Considering the sound devices mentioned above we can say that the

poem does not display the music.

The following words are repeated in the poem:

• i

haw (2), small (2), then (2), yon (5),

Such a lexical repetition creates a feeling of intensity in the poem.

Heaney’s syntactic foregrounding is as follows:

■ The poet uses a long complex sentence yvhich completes/runs

i '

through the first five lines of the poem: The second stanza begins at

line no. 6 which runs through the sejcqnd stanza upto line no. 13

forming one complex sentence.

This is quite unique in this poem and we can say that the use

of syntax in the poem is very significantly , and' meaningfully

foregrounded. The divison of the poem into two stanzas, it will

appear, is based on its syntax, is; the sense the sentence no.l, is
I •

suitably cut to form the first stanza and similarly the second stanza is

also cut into poetic lines meaningfully. The first stanza appears to

379
make a statement which is separated by ‘but’ with which the

sentence in the second stanza begins. •

Heaney uses the following metaphors in the poem.

F Haw is burning (1)

Concrctivc Metaphor

L The city is burning

F crab of the thorn (2)

Animistic Metaphor

L crab in the kitchen

F small light for small people (2)

>- Humanistic Metaphor

L bright light for children

F the wick of self-respect (4) Concrctivc Metaphor

L the wick of the lamp

F blind them with illustration (5)

► Concrctivc Metaphor
L blind them with a piece of cloth

F your breath plumes in the frost (6)

► Concretive Metaphor
L The breath is visible when it is

snowing

F its pecked-at ripeness that scans

you (13)
f
► Concrctivc Metaphor
L The parrot pecks at the riped fruit

380
 “All allegorical stories are about loss and salvation”.11 We can

apply this remark in a wider sense to Heaney since lie talks of

judgement very directly in this poem. The haw lights the winter

landscape and seems like Diogenes’ lantern as the poet seeks

‘one just man’. We flinch at its judgement as it ‘scans you than

moves on’. This is the ordinary condition of life ‘a small light for

small people’ suddenly rising in judgement and testing whether we

are just. But the poem discusses not whether we are lost or saved, but 1

the haw itself and its dual role as ordinary light and extraordinary

judge. It is this dual possibility in creation and event that appears to

be important in this poem.

“The achievement of the poem, afterall, is an experience of

release. In that liberated moment, when the lyric discovers its

buoyant completion and a timeless formal pleasure comes to fullness

and exhaustion, something occurs which is equidistant from

j •

self-justification and self-obliteration”.12 This remark on poetry, in

general by Heaney, applies to most of his poems appeared in several,

anthologies including the present poem.

381
 The Mud Vision
Statuesjwith exjposed heartsland barbed/wire crowns
1.
x / ' |x x / « / /ix x / ,
2. Still stood) in alcoves, pares flitted beneath
X. /I X- /» * ’xI ' X I / X r / X '■
3. The doling betties ofljets, ourfmenu-jwnters
^ / i / I /* pc
4. And punka with aaosol sprays held their own
X X / X /IX X 1 / X
With the bestjof them. Satellite(link-ups
/ X i/ x xfX // X . x |> / !?» /
6. Wafted (over usythe blessings of(popes, heliports
X / f* / »/ x x // x |* /
7. Maintained a charmed/circle for idols bn tour
X /) X X I * ^ / t -X x|/ /
8. And casualties on tlieir stretchers. We (sleepwalked
X / » x / | / x x f / XIX / ]/ X
9. The line) between/panic and/fonnipae, screeritested
X / |/ X | / X X |X. / |X X | / x
10 Our firstfnativejinodels andlthe lastjof the (mummers,
/ X | / / x' i/ x
11 Watching ourselves) at a distance, advantaged
And ai(y as |aman)on a Springboard
12
13. Who keepsjlimbeijmg up because the/ man cannot dive.

X X U X / f X /IX X IX /
14. And theij in the fojggy midlands it (appeared,
X / /x XXX/-/ XX/
15. Our mud vision, as if a rose window of mud
., * x / 1 X X / t X XfX ' Jx X /
16. Had invented itself(out of/the: gl jfttery damp,
x /1 x / * | x / 1/* x tx / « x
17. A gosjsamer wheelJ concentric witty its ownjhub

382
 x x]/ x t / jx r \ r x
18. Of nejbulousj dirt, suljied yet/lucent.
xx / ,* X / , / X | /. * ,x /
19. We had heard|of the sun/standing still and/the sun
That changed[colour* butjwe were|vouchsafed
20.
x /u X / , / Cl * , * ,1 A 2
21. Original clay, transfigured and/spinning.
X X- iX / 1/ / I / / * 1/ x
22. And then the sunjsets ran|murky, the/wiper
/ h x x // * f 11 A 1A 1 f
23. Could newer entirely clean/off the/windscreen,
X /I X / lx X I f x|/ /
24. Reservoirs tasted of/silt, a/light razz
X / [ X X / IX X / / jx* /
25. Accuredlin the hair and the/eyebrows/ and some
Took toj wearing a/smudge on tlieirjforeheads
26.
XXIX/ I* X I / x j / x
27. To be/prepared/for whatever ./Vigils
Began/to be/kept mjound puddled gaps,
28.
X /IX / // x|/ X x I / x
l
29. On al/ars buljrushes jbusted the/lilies
X X l JX X // X )/ * id Lent
30. And a rota/of inyalids jbame anc
X / IX / w / )x / ) X X /
31. On beds /they could/lease place™ in rangy of the shower.

2 XjX- /. )* x / lx- /
32. A generation/who had seen! a sign.
/ / |X X/IXX/fX./Zx /
33. Those nightsjwhen we stoocf in an ui^ber deWand smeUed
/ X X IX //x X / )/ X /
34. Mould in the/verbepa, or wokjfe to a light
X/// *x)/X X J x /
35. Furrowpbreath on the/pillow, whep die talk

383
36. Was all hbout/ who had seer/ it andfour /ear

X / /* X /)* '., 1 / * f / ,/
37. Was touched/with a secret pride/ only purselves
/ X IX X / I X X |X / \ / X | /, x
38. Could betadequate/then to/our lives.jWhen th«/ rainbow
/ t j ^ -x / / ly f jx ' I f
39. Curved floodf-brown and ran like a watpr-rat’s/back

40. So tliat dijvers on/the hard/shoulder/switched ofljto watch,

X fm / ] x1 X / L
41. We wisheq it away,/ and yet Kve presumed it a test
* x y Ix / / \ f / M.X u.x
42. ration
Tliat would prove/ us beyond expectation.

* / IX / | pc / IX / x /
43. We lived of course to learn the fo of that.
/ day) itXX
One / ■ i x - the
was gone/and x eastlgable
/
44.
45. /
Where X i trembling
its/ / / i-X //X had
corojla I !
X balanced

46. Was strajkl y a ruinj again Jwith dankelions

/ X // /|x X |/ ; |x /
47. Blowinglhigh upl on the ledges,/and moss
x / I x X / IX.. . X /. ] X / / y / /
48. Tliat slumbered on througty its increase/.' As ca/neras raked
A xix / j x / )x x/ 1
49. Hie site/from ev^ry angle, experts
X / |X / // x 1 / x Ax’ / JX x
50. Began/ their postpactum /j abbei?
si? aand all/of us
f X * j/ XIX / rxxi/x
51. Crowded in/tight for/the big/explanjations.
f / |X x) * / / x x /lx'* /
52. Just likq that, we/forgot/that the vision was ours,
X / I / xr / x ■ xi/ -xix x
53. Our one/chance to (know thqf incomparable

384
 X / ) x x /1 x / ]/ 7 ] / xl/’x
54. And dive to a future. Wliaf might havjb been origin
X X /// x x// x j / x 1/ /
55. We dissipated in pews. The/clarified place
x x / I t x 1* x IX /f x /
56. Had retrieve^ neither/us nor/itself-fexcept
XX / IX X / f ' / lx X I / x
57. You could say/we survived/ So say/that, and/watch us
/■ x y j / xxi/ / ]x ' / I> x i/ /
58. Who had our/chance to be /mud-men^ convinced and jbstranged,
; X' X j> / I f XX!/ X ]x - /
59. Figure in/our.own/ eyes for the/eyes of ihe world.

Metrical Structure

385
 The Mud Vision

1. Statues witli exposed hearts and barbed-wire crowns

ccvccvc cvc vcccvcc cvcc vcc cvcc cv ccvcc

2. Still stood in alcoves, hares flitted beneath

ccvc ccvc vc vccvc cvc ccvcvc cvcvc

3. The dozing bellies of jets, our menu-writers

cv cvcvc cvcvc vc cvcc v cvccv cvcvc

4. And punks with aerosol sprays held, their own

vcc cvccc cvc vcvcvccccvc cvcccv vc *

5. With the best of them. Satellite link- rips

cvc cv cvcc vccvc cvcvcvc. cvcc ycc
•i ' !

6. Wafted over®the blessings of pqpes, heliports

cvccvc, vc vc\cv ccvcvcc vc cvcc cvcvcvcc Io
2>S> o :
7. Maintained a charmed circle for idols on tour
cvccvcc vcvcc cvcc cv vcvccvc cv

8. And casualties on their stretchers.- We sleepwalked

vcc cvcvccvc vccv cccvcvc cy ccvccvccvc

9. The line between panic and formulae, screentested

cv cvc cvccvc cvcvcvcc cvccvcv cccvccvccvc
To Pi 3gy,

10. IQupfirst native models and the last of the mummers,

vv cvcc cvcvc cvcvcc vcc cv cvcc vc cv cvcvc To fq

11. (^atchin^ ourselves at a distance, advantaged

cvcvc vcvccvc vcv cvccvcc vccvccvcc
To pq *3>^

12. And airy as aQna^on a springboard

vcc vcv vc v cvc vc v cccvccvc

386
 _________-Pmvw. f 3&
13. Who keeps limbering up because the(£a^cannot dive,
cv cvcc cvccvcvcvc cvcvc cv cvc cvcvc cvc

14. And then in the foggy midlands it appeared,

vcc cvc vc cv cvCv cvccvcce vc vcvc

To fj 3>o
15. Our majiyision) as if a rose window of tmuc
vv cvc cvcvcXvc vc v cvc cvccv vccvc To ?3

16. Had invented itself out of the glittery damp,

cvc vccvccvc vccvcc vc vccv ccvcvcvcvcc

17. A gossamer wheel, concentric with its own hub

v cvcvcv cvc cvccvcccvccvc vccvc cvc

18. Of nebulous dirt, sullied yet lucent,

vc cvccvcvc cvc cvcvc cvcccvcvcc

19. We had heard of the(sun)standing still and the{

cv cvc cvc vc cv cvcccvccvc ccvcvcc cv cvc

20. That changed colour, but we were vouchsafed

cvc cvccc cvcv cvc cv cv cvccvcc

21. Original clay, transfigured and spinning,

vcvcvcvc ccv ccvcccvcvc vcc ccvcvc

22. And then the(su§sets ran murky, the wiper

vcc cvc cv cvccvcc cvc cvcv cv cvcv

23. Could never entirely clean off the windscreen,

cvc cvcv vccwcvccvc vc cv cvccccvc
To Ps 2%%
■>
24. Reservoirs tasted of silt, a(ji| fuzz
cvcvcvc cvccvc vc cvcc v cvc cvc

25. Accured in the hair and the eyebrows, and some

vccvc vc cv cv vcc cv vccvc vcc cvc

387
26. Took to wearing a smudge on their foreheads
cvc CV CVCVC CCVC VC cv cvcvcc

27. To be prepared for whatever. Vigils

cvcv ccvcvc cvcvcvcv cvcvcc

28. Began to be kept around puddled gaps,

cvcvc cv cv cvcc vcvcc cvccc cvcc

29. On altars bulrushes ousted the lilies

vc vccvc cvccvevc vccvc cv cvcvc

30. And a rota of invalids came and went

vcc v cvcv vc vccvcvcc cvc vcccvcc

31. On beds they could lease placed in range of the shower,

vc cvcc cv cvc cvc ccvcc vc cvcc vc cv cvcv

32. A generation (who hadSeen)a sign,

v cvcvcvcvc cv cvc cvc v cvc

3 3. Those nights when we stood in an umber dew and smelled

cvc cvcc cvc cv ccvc vc vc vccv ccv vcc ccvcc
fig 3
34. Mould in the verbena, or woke to a(li
cvcc vc cv cvcvcv v cvc cvvcvc

35. Furrow-breath on tlie/pillow, when the talk

cvcv ccvc vccv/cvcv cvc cv cvc

36. Was all about (who had\seen)it and our fear

cvc vcvcvc cv cvc cvc vcvcc v cv

37. Was touched with a secret pride, only ourselves

cvc cvcc * cvc vcvccvcccvc vccv vcvccvc

388
 p'Lov-v P<y 3>?^>

38. Could be adequate then to (ouplives. When the rainbow

cvc cvvcvccvc cvc cvv\ cvcc cvc cv cvccv To ^

39. Curved flood-brown and ran like a water-rat’s back

cvcc ccvc ccvc vcccvccvc vcvcv cvcc cvc

40. So that divers on the hard shoulder switched off to<$yatcji)~<;—-—-—

cv cvc ccvcvc vc cv cvc cvccv ccvcc vc cv cvc

41. We wished it away, and yet we presumed it a test

cv cvcc vcvcv vcccvccv ccvccvcc vcvcvcc
---------- 1—

42. That would prove(us)beyond expectation,

cvc cvc ccvc vc cvcvcc vcccvccvcvc

43. We lived of course, to learn the folly of that,

cv cvcc vc cvc cvcvc cv cvcvvccvc

44. One day it was gone and the east gable

cvc cvc vc cvc cvc vcc cv vcc cvcc

45. Where its trembling corolla had balanced

cv vccccvcccvc cvcvcv cvc cvcvccc

46. Was strarkly a ruin again, with dandelions

cvc ccvccv v cvc vcvc cvc cvcccvcvcc

47. Blowing high up on the ledges, and moss

ccwc cv vc vc cv cvcvc vcc cvc

48. That slumbered on through its increase. As cameras raked

cvc ecvccvc vcccv vccvcccvc vc cvcvcvccvcc

49. The site from every angle, experts

cv cvc ccvc vcvcv vccc vcccvcc
A CV* t<\
50. Began their post factum jabber and all of (us)^
cvcvc cv cvcc cvccvc cvcv vcc vcvcvc

389
5 l. Crowded in tight for the big explanations,
ccvcvc vc cvc cv cv cvc vccccvcvcc
pA-o i-v\ Pj 3 % 7~
52. Just like that, we forgot that the(^isioh)was(p^sl
cvcc cvc cvc vc cvcvc cvc cv cvcvc cvc wc k 'It 3^

53. {Our)one chance to know the incomparable

Wv cvc cvcc cv cv cv; vccvccvcvcc

54. And dive to a future. What might have been origin

vcc CVC CV V ccvcv cvc cvc cvc cvc vcvcvc

55. We dissipated in news. The clarified place

cv cvcvcvcvc vc ccvc cv ccvcvcvc ccvc
\ t * ,
56. Had retrieved neither (jisjnor; itself- except
cvc cvccvcc cvcv vclpv 'vccVcc vccvcc
You could ^^wesurvivedjSo^^that, and watches) Pftovvv ti s%6
57. <z-
cv cvc cv cv cvcvcvc cvcv cvc vcc cvc vc ■p-ox**. .(^"' 3^7
---------------- <-----------------

Who had our chance to be tjnuq-faien, convinced and estranged,

,cv cvc w cvcc cv cv cvc cvc cvccvccc vcc cccvcc

59. Figure in(our)own eyes for the eyes of the world,

cvcv vc v vc vc cv cv vc vc cv cvcc

Syllabic Structure and Lexical Repetition

390
Chunks No. of syllables in each line
I 10 10 12 10 10
(I) (2) (3) (4) (5)
12 10 11 13 13
(6) (7) (8) (9) (10)
11 10 13
(II) (12) (13)
. n • 11 12 13 12 10
(14) (15) (16) (17) (18)
12 9 11 11 11
(19) (20) (21) (22) (23)
10 11 9 9 9
(24) (25) (26) (27) (28)
11 11 11
(29) (30) (31)
III 10 12 11 10 II
(32) (33) (34) (35) (36)
12 13 11 13 13
(37) (38) (39) (40) (41)
10
(42)

Cont.

391
 . IV 11 9 10 11 10
(43) (44) (45) (46) (47)
13 9 12 11 12 '
(48) (49) (50) (51) (52)
11 12 12 11 12
(53) (54) (55) (56) (57)
12 12
(58) (59)

Table No. 7

The publication of The Haw Lantern in 1987 suggests that

Heaney is still concerned with the state of affairs in Northern Ireland

and also that he sees it in the broader context of human difficulties,

for of course Ulster is not the only spot on the earth where truth and

justice are not generally at work in society. It may be that here his

American experience has borne fruit in giving him a greater distance

and a radically different social situation to view the Troubles from.

A number of poems exploit this new visionary stance, for

instance “The Song of the Bullet”, “The Disappearing Island”. “The

Mud Vision” and “The Haw Lantern”. These poems make an attempt

to get at truth symbolically and allegorically rather than through the

realistic description.

392
 This poem which is in blank verse arises from Heaney’s desire

to respect amplitude even in an analytic poem such as this. “This

^'

religious-political-social poem begins with a bitter sataric portrait of

an unnamed country dithering between atavistic superstition and

yuppip modernity.”13 The landscape created in the poem displays a

thin layer of industrial modernization over a dissolute rural

emptiness in a typical scene terrorist casualties are carried in a

heliport beyond the latest touring rock star.

In the image created in the lines 11 and 12, Heaney catches the

“advantaged and airy” (line 10, 11) complicancy of an impotent >

nation congratulating itself on political flexibility as a way of

concealing indecisiveness. The despair brilliantly hidden in this

sketch casts up a compensatory vision.

In the title of the poem a whirling rainbow-wheel of

transperent mud appears in the foggy midlands of this unnamed

country and a fine silt of earth spreads from it to touch every crany.

The poet tries to catch the vision and its effect on those who see it in

the following lines:

393
 And then in the fogy midlands it appeared,
Our inud vision, as if a rose window of mud
Had invented itself out of the glittery damp,
A gossamer wheel, concentric with its own hub
Of nebulous dirt, sullied yet lucent.
We had heard of the sun standing still and the sun
That changed colour, but we were vouchsafed
Original clay, transfigured and spinning. (14-21)

The poem runs out of steam trying to imagine how

“The Mud Vision” banishes traditional religion. Eventually the

vision disappears in the “post factum jabber” (line 49) of experts.

“We had our chance,” says the speaker, “to be mud men, convinced

estranged,” but in hesitation all opportunity was lost. “Vision” is

meant in the entirely human sense puts perhaps a too religious cast

on clay. This poem puts many of Heaney’s qualities on record his

territorial piety, his visual wit, his ambition for better Ireland, his

reflectiveness, his anger. He has made an attempt somehow to find a

style that can absorb them all.

Let us consider the poem for its iinguistic analysis and see if

the analysis to be worked out enhances our understanding of the

394
poem. The poem runs into 59 long lines divided into 4 chunks of

uneven number of lines. The polysyllabic words are proportionally

high and they are foregrounded in such a way that the reader has to

make every effort to build up meaning structure, taking recourse to

the different linguistic levels and also to the use of lexis operating in

the poem in different contexts.

The poem does not display any end rhyme scheme as such. It

is written in iambic pentametre and the tone is a rising one.

However, the use of a large number of trochees create falling rhythm

intermitantly. The pyrrhics and spondees modulate the basic rhythm

again creating a metrical variety resulting in good rhythm.

Alliteration connects the following words meaningfully.

still stood (2) models murmurs (10)

standing sun still (19) had heard (19)

could clean (23) seen sign (32)

gfootT^smelled (33) ran ^rat (38)

lived learn (42) gone ^gable (43)

say ^mvdved^so 'say (56) mud ^men (57)

395
 Assonance:

with its (17) and ran back (38) rat ran (38)
in /</ -/*/ n t*i
There is a dense foregrounding of consonance as shown
N in
below:

exposed^ and^barbed (1) alcoves hares (2)

stood^ flittetj (2) writters^ bellie^ (3) best^satellite (5)

popes^ heliports^us (6) maintained^charmed (7)

casualties^stretcher^ (8) first^last (10). man__ on (12)

window mud (15) had invented (16) dirt yet lucent (18)

had^ heard^and (19) then^ran(22) silt^ light(24)

aroimd puddled (28) alters bull-rashes lilies (29)

rota^ went (30) beds^ lease (31) wished^Jt^yejMLest (40)

woiildjbeyond (41) thaMforge^ (51) had^retrieved (55)

could survived (56)

The poem is thus foregrounded with a number of soimd devices as

mentioned above which add music to it.

The syntax is by and large very straightforward in the sense a

majority of the lines are run-on type. For instance, line no.l is

syntactically continued upto the middle of line 8. It is followed by

396
another complex sentence which is continued upto tlie end of line 13.

Line no. 14-18 is one long complex sentence. This is followed by the

next sentence upto line no. 21. This is followed by another very long

complex sentence from line no. 22 to the end of line 31. Line no. 32

is a foregrounding of an exclamatory sentence which is followed by

one more very long complex sentence from line no. 33-42. The last

chunk begins with a line of syntactically complete sentence. This is

followed by once again a long complex sentence running from line

44-48. The last but two sentences is continued upto line no. 51. This

is followed by a sentence with two clauses and the last one begins in

the middle of line 55 and moves on until the end of the poem.

It has been already mentioned at the beginning of the analysis

that the poem is composed in four verse paragraphs. “This term has

been' applied to successions of blank verse lines which seem

cemented into one long monumental unit of experience.”14

The verse paragraph is neither a unit of syntax nor a unit of

verse. It is a structure which arises from the interrelation of the two.

Such use of verse paragraph avoids finality. Another variation

regarding the use of syntax in this poem is that all the lines begin

397
with a capital letter whether the word appearing at the beginning of

die line is the beginning of the grammatical sentence or not.

Compoundings used:

barbed - wire rfieno - writers

-
V + ed N
i_____________ »
N H
l________ i

link - ups furrow - breath

Y + Prep N- N
L------------- >
H H

flood - brown water - rats back

N Adj. N N N
L_-----------r 1_____ _»
M M H

mud - men

The metaphoric use of language is illustrated in the following

examples:

F Statues widi exposed hearts (1) -j

r Concrclivc Metaphor
L Statues with exposed inarbel'. J

F hairs flitted beneath the dozing

bellies ofjets (2, 3) ]

r Humanistic Metaphor
L Beneath the dozing bellies of

sumo wrestlers

398
F a rose window of mud (15)

L a beautiful window of glass

} Concretive Metaphor

F the sun standing still and the

sun that changed the colour (19,20)~|

Humanistic Metaphor

F the man standing still and the

sun changing his colour

F touched with a secret pride (37) ^ Synestlietic Metaphor

L touched with smooth hands

T V
F the rainbow... ran like a water

rats back (38, 39)

} Humanizing

L the deer ran

F moss that slumbered on (47,48)

} Animistic
L Dog that slumbered on .

F as cameras raked die sight (47,48)

L the mob raked the sight

} Humanistic

F the eyes of the world (59)

L the eyes of the people

} Humanizing

399
 Conclusion
Though Heaney has written the poems such as ‘Lovers on

Aran’, and ‘Honeymoon Flight’ appeared in his

Death of a Naturalist to celebrate unity and exhilaration of love and

marriage, Heaney, in this phase for the first time, offers a delightful
, /*

array of erotic movements and images in ‘Field Work’ in

Field Work. “This is a Heaney not seen before, not even in the erotic

homages to the female bog people, for he expresses a tenderness as

well as a need that his highly masculine, verse has not heretofore
IS
acknowledged.” These poems suggest the various ways in which the

lover can find the emblems of his desire in nature.

Heaney uses his style of cutting the poem either in some

sections, using couplets, tercets or four or five line stanzas or just one'

section. The length of die poems also varies according to die subject

and the form and so tiiere is a variety of formal structure. Heaney

uses run-on lines which suggest the grammatical flow in the poems.

The basic foot that he uses in the poems is iambic with some

modulations creating rising or falling tone, breaking the monotony.

One very significant thing which we have observed in his earlier

400
work is Heaney’s focus on the formal structure, and the definitive

end rhyme scheme. In the course of time the poems that Heaney has

written lack the end rhyme scheme. He continues to use a variety of

/

compound formations. In the poems of this phase we also find a

variety of dense use of metaphors and images displaying. The sound

devices used create musicality in the poems like in the poems written

in the first phase though not as much.

Heaney’s interest of using sonnet form indicates his strong

desire of re-establishing the old values of order. The sonnets of this

phase are neither Shakespearean nor Petrarchan. With regard to the

formal structure of the sonnet, it is ‘up-side down’. The ‘Glanmore

Sonnets’ represent a remarkable step in Heaney’s poetic

development as the violence done to the English poetic line in

Wintering Out and North. Heaney appeals to have taken a

considerable risk in composing these sonnets as he has never

mastered iambic pentametre as we have already observed in the

metrical analysis of his poems so far worked out. Heaney is a

modem poet and so he takes greater liberties in the use of metrics.

The sonnets affirm the thought that life is more than death, there are

401
places of peace, that hate and vengeance are not the only possible

ruling passions, that love exists.

Heaney is such a poet who composes the shorter poems of

three lines to the longer ones of 75-80 lines. He gives evidence of the

longer poems in the sequence of *Station Island’. In the sequence

Heaney offers us a new structure for complex experiences of

childhood and adolescent recall, an ironic religious sense and a deep

political unease. They are entirely expressive of Heaney’s ‘genuine

interests’. Here he encounters with dead figures who are personally

known and also important to him as . a writer. Heaney reduces the

mythological elements and employs it structurally. Heaney uses the

language and the diction that matches the subject matter and creates

the lexical cohesion. He continues to be a rich poet in the use of

tactile language while expressing abstractions like emptiness,

absence and distance. Heaney’s use of prolific imagery noticed in his

earlier poetry, but more so in ‘North’, is absent in this phase.

However in ‘The Haw Lantern’ Heaney shows his skill in using a

single allegorical image throughout and displays a new style of

dealing with imagery in his work written in the IInd phase. Like other

poems of the collection. ‘The Haw Lantern’ reflects a new despair of

402
country and of self. Forsaking topical reference and writing at a

distance and it loses immediacy of reference. He does not use the

end rhyme scheme in these poems.

Heaney’s unique quality is the use 6f syntax in this phase

which is distinctly different from its use in the first phase. It seems

that Heaney’s structuring of poetic lines is based on “flowing

syntax” which runs through and overflows the line boundaries.

Heaney continues to show a genuine concern for the state of

affairs in Northern Ireland but he sees it in the broader context of

human difficulties and suffering and in doing so he expands his

horizons of attitudes. Heaney’s American experience might have

brought the distance and a different social situation to view the

‘Troubles’ from. This visionary stance is exploited in a number of

»i

poems e.g. ‘The Song of the Bullet’, ‘The Disappearing Land’, ‘The

Mud Vision’ and the title poem ‘The Haw Lantern’.- Instead of using

realistic description, Heaney uses symbols and allegories to convey

the truth and generally uses blank verse fonn to enable him'to

express himself effectively.

403
 Notes and References

1. Thomas C. Foster, Seamus Heaney. Dublin, The O’Brien Press,

1989, p.122.

2. Ibid.

3. Ibid., p. 94.

4. Michael Parker, Seamus Heanev: The Making of the Poet.

London, Macmillan, 1993, p. 167.

5. Thomas C. Foster, Seamus Heanev. Dublin, The O’Brien Press,

1989,p. 94.
i

6. Ibid., p. 98.

7. Barbara Hardy, “Meeting the Myth: Station Island” in The Art

of Seamus Heanev. ed. Tony Curtis, Bridgend, Seren, 1994,

p. 153.

8. Ibid.

9. Ibid., p. 155.

10. Helen Vendler, “Second Thoughts: The Haw Lantern”, in The..

Art of Seamus Heanev. ed. Tony Curtis, Bridgend, Seren,

*

1994, p.175.

404
11. Ronald Taraplin, Seamus Heaney. Milton Keynes-

Dhiladelphia, Open University Press, 1989, p. 99.

12. Ibid., p.102.

13. Vendler, Helen, “Second Thoughts: The Haw Lantern” in

The Art sf Seamus Heanev. ed. Tony Curtis, Bridgend, Seren,

1994, p.169.

14. Geoffrey Leech, A Linguistic Guide to English Poetry, London,

Macmillan, 1977, p. 125.

15. Thomas C. Foster, Seamus Heanev. Dublin, The O’Brien Press,

1989, p. 94.

405