PLASTIC Poetry Notes – GCSE English Literature Past and Present: Poetry Anthology – Love and Relationships – Mother, any distance P.18

Poetic devices and their effects – form

(ballad, sonnet, free verse, dramatic monologue),

alliteration, rhyme, rhythm, onomatopoeia,

Dramatic monologue The speaker’s own perspective on moving into a new house and their changing relationship with their mother

Rhyme – half rhyme, internal rhyme, end rhyme

Leaving, unreeling

Pinch/inch

Sky/Fly

Leaving, unreeling (the half rhyme perhaps suggests the changing relationship, the moving apart. Pinch/inch stresses the last attempt to hold onto each other. Sky/Fly suggests/stresses the opportunity to grown and soar in an adult world of infinite possibilities away from the mother

The overall lack of certainty in the rhyme scheme perhaps suggests a feeling of dislocation – that the speaker is feeling unsettled.

Juxtaposition Anchor and Kite. The two metaphorical things the mother has symbolised to the speaker. Anchor – meaning safety – a bedrock to make sure they never drifted in life. Kite meaning allowed to enjoy themselves and fly relatively freely but yet still connected

Sonnet form Very nearly a sonnet form – stereotypically a love poem. Obviously this is a love poem celebrating what his mother meant and means to him, and what she has allowed him to be able to do in adult life.

Language and its effects – what sort of words

are in the poem? Violent, loving, colloquial, archaic,

semantic fields, diction, religious, romantic language

Words to do with land size – acres, prairies Shows how huge this new step is in life for the speaker. Also, the prairie has wild echoes – suggesting a place to roam like a playful animal

Language of space and the atmosphere – space-walk, hatch, sky and fly

Suggests the endless possibilities of the new life of the speaker. This is a doorway into a new and exciting time and they are about to let go forever.

Language of measurement – recording, reporting, The language of professionalism – could reflect

PLASTIC Poetry Notes – GCSE English Literature Past and Present: Poetry Anthology – Love and Relationships – Mother, any distance P.18

centimetres the adult world of work and the ways in which everything in that world has to be exact and carefully measured.

Alternative interpretations – Can quotations

be read in two ways for different meanings?

Acres of walls Sense of space and freedom in his new life – a sense of space that will never be filled – a void

The Zero-end The mother giving birth to the child at the start of his life. Zero is now a new life starting for the speaker as he moves away.

Something has to give Their relationship will never be the same or the speaker is trying to gain his freedom which the mother is reluctantly clinging on to.

Structure and its effects – tonal shifts, pace,

caesura, what rhyme stresses, beginning, middle, end,

repetition, dialogue and where it happens, enjambment

Starts off with a sense of space on earth – starts off indoors with household imagery, then likens the floor to acres, prairies

Sense that the task seems achievable but the flat then feels empty

Middle of the poem – sense of connection fore-grounded in different ways, becoming increasingly looser

In the middle of the poem, you get a sense that the connection is starting to go. There is a regretful implied tone in Anchor as that was the mother once was and that is now in the past.

As to give – dramatic break of line in stanza Sense that the connection between the two may have finally severed and the speaker has been let loose into the world

Tone and its effects – talking about moods

which are evoked and where, narrative voice

Requires a second pair of hands Sense of necessity at this point. Also treating the mother as something to simply help – a pair of hands!

Unreeling years between us Sense of time spinning away. A tone of pace and speed – like their life together is flashing momentarily past the speaker’s eyes

PLASTIC Poetry Notes – GCSE English Literature Past and Present: Poetry Anthology – Love and Relationships – Mother, any distance P.18

Endless sky to fall or fly An apprehensive tone possibly – the speaker is not sure whether or not they will achieve in life, through it is interesting that fly comes last – suggesting a final tone of positivity

Imagery and its effects – metaphor, simile,

personification, visual sense

Spool of tape Represents the umbilical cord which connected the child to the mother in the womb.

Empty bedrooms – metaphor The lack of people that are in this new life – the notion that he has to populate the house with his own family

The line still feeding out The connection between them is still there, but getting much weaker. The interesting thing is the use of ‘feeding’ – this has connotation of motherhood and suckling a baby.

Context – authorial, social and historicalThe poem is from the ‘Book of Matches’ (1993) which is a collection of poems without titles. Each poem is meant to be read in the time it takes a match to burn down - about twenty seconds, unless you want to burn your fingers. There is a pun in the title: we call a packet from which we tear out the matches a book, but this is also a book in the normal sense, with words for us to read.