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Reluctance Poem Analysis

This poem is about a speaker returning home after traveling for a long time. Upon arriving, the speaker sees that the landscape has changed with snow on the ground and leaves fallen from the trees. The speaker had hoped to see a flower but finds it has disappeared. The speaker does not want to accept these changes and wants to reject the coming of winter. The poem uses imagery and personification to describe the changing seasons and the speaker's reluctance to accept what they find upon returning home.

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160 views

Reluctance Poem Analysis

This poem is about a speaker returning home after traveling for a long time. Upon arriving, the speaker sees that the landscape has changed with snow on the ground and leaves fallen from the trees. The speaker had hoped to see a flower but finds it has disappeared. The speaker does not want to accept these changes and wants to reject the coming of winter. The poem uses imagery and personification to describe the changing seasons and the speaker's reluctance to accept what they find upon returning home.

Uploaded by

api-522446543
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
Available Formats
Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Akshay Wuppuluri

Moosman

IB LA HL

02 September 2021

Reluctance poem analysis


This poem contains lots of imagery that pulls the reader into the story and into the

shoes of the speaker. These words and phrases present a clear picture of the situation in the

poem with words like scraping and creeping as well as hither and thither.

The poem is about the speaker arriving home. They come home after traveling, moving,

and shifting to different places and when they arrive home they don’t expect to see what they

see as the world is left in a surprising state. The world is different as they see snow on the

ground, leaves and plant life have withered away and stopped growing, and the flower that

they long to admire has disappeared. The speaker does not want to acknowledge and accept

this and instead pushes back and tries to get back all that they have lost.

The first stanza talks about the speaker coming home after traveling for so long but

doesn’t seem to be in a rush to get home. They move slowly as they go up the hill and slowly

look at the view. When they see this they realize they are home and that their time of traveling

and adventuring has come to an end. There is lots of imagery in the first stanza as you can

picture the speaker climbing the wall and looking at a view over a hill. There is also the use of

alliteration with the words “wall” and “wended.”

The second stanza talks about the changing of the seasons from summer to fall and

finally to winter. There are leaves from fall that have fallen and have been withered and
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wrinkled. The leaves are kept by the oak tree which is an example of personification. The leaves

then scrape and creep over the hard crusted snow. This is imagery as well as we can clearly see

a picture of leaves being held onto but eventually being let go and slowly going over snow

making a crumpling sound.

In the third stanza the speaker thinks of leaving again even after coming back from a

long trip. He questions why he is still there and whether he should “whither.” Here we see the

leaves being personified as they are “blown hither and thither.” This shows that leaves are

given a sense of direction and purpose when they really don’t. There is alliteration with the

letter ‘w’ with multiple words and phrases.

In the fourth stanza the speaker wants to push back and reject the idea of winter. They

say that it is treason to man to accept things and let things go. We see the speaker refusing to

bow and accept this coming of winter.

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