The Falling Leaves
- Submitted by: megsymoos
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- Category: English
- Date Submitted: 09/30/2011 04:41 AM
- Pages: 3
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The Falling Leaves
World war one had just begun and nobody had ever experience anything like it before. I think that this poem describes the stillness and the silence, the deadly silence of a tragic time in the trenches. It implies that everything is paying respects to the deceased, like the whole world has stop to remember them (three minute silence). The entire poem is a metaphor for the loss of life, they are never referred to as soldiers however, the soldiers are described as nature. Nature is beautiful and this, in my mind, is clearly the underlying message – that the soldiers will always be beautiful. Nature is a never ending cycle, through the seasons leaves grow and fall throughout time, this will never change. And for as long as wars are being fought, the same will be happening to soldiers.
The line “They fell like snowflakes wiping out the noon,” suggests that snowflakes layer the floor and eventually cover it completely. It is the same for the soldiers, as they fall one by one, more of the ground disappears, they fall one on top of each other just as snowflakes do. And as the snowflakes melt, effectively the soldiers do to, seeping into the ground like the snow, disappearing without a trace.
Although there is other punctuation, in particular the semi-colon at the half way point, the poem is actually written in one complete sentence. This has the effect of presenting one complete idea without allowing the reader to split up the ideas, which would reduce the impact of the poem as a whole.
The rhythmic structure of the poem is 1, 2, 1, 2: Six syllables followed by ten. This gives the poem a regularity, which makes me think of the predictable order of the cycle of life which the poem is describing. There is no rhyme at the end of each line but the poet does use alliteration. “When no wind whirled them whistling to the sky,” The alliteration emphasises how active these words really are, they generally describe movement. I think it refers to how the...
World war one had just begun and nobody had ever experience anything like it before. I think that this poem describes the stillness and the silence, the deadly silence of a tragic time in the trenches. It implies that everything is paying respects to the deceased, like the whole world has stop to remember them (three minute silence). The entire poem is a metaphor for the loss of life, they are never referred to as soldiers however, the soldiers are described as nature. Nature is beautiful and this, in my mind, is clearly the underlying message – that the soldiers will always be beautiful. Nature is a never ending cycle, through the seasons leaves grow and fall throughout time, this will never change. And for as long as wars are being fought, the same will be happening to soldiers.
The line “They fell like snowflakes wiping out the noon,” suggests that snowflakes layer the floor and eventually cover it completely. It is the same for the soldiers, as they fall one by one, more of the ground disappears, they fall one on top of each other just as snowflakes do. And as the snowflakes melt, effectively the soldiers do to, seeping into the ground like the snow, disappearing without a trace.
Although there is other punctuation, in particular the semi-colon at the half way point, the poem is actually written in one complete sentence. This has the effect of presenting one complete idea without allowing the reader to split up the ideas, which would reduce the impact of the poem as a whole.
The rhythmic structure of the poem is 1, 2, 1, 2: Six syllables followed by ten. This gives the poem a regularity, which makes me think of the predictable order of the cycle of life which the poem is describing. There is no rhyme at the end of each line but the poet does use alliteration. “When no wind whirled them whistling to the sky,” The alliteration emphasises how active these words really are, they generally describe movement. I think it refers to how the...