Speaker or Narrator, and Point of View
The poem 'Borrowed Time' is written from the first-person point of view, almost as an inner monologue, mixed with pleading at the moon and a narrative description of events
Form and Meter
The poem 'Ageing' is written in regular sestets and is split into two parts.
Metaphors and Similes
The simile 'like a magazine illustration / from childhood days,' in the poem 'Ageing' reveals the disconnect between the speaker and what she used to do, and the 'young girl on her blades,' currently doing it.
Alliteration and Assonance
In the poem 'The Knot,' the alliteration 'words would come and cluster together like wasps / between the carvings on the temple roof,' emphasizes the movement of the words.
Irony
The irony of the poem 'The Storm' is that they are 'fighting the weather,' rather than having to 'struggle with grief.'
Genre
The poem 'Handbag' is reflective and almost autobiographical in a way.
Setting
The poem 'Ageing' is set in a non-specific time within the speaker's old age.
Tone
The tone of the poem 'Archive Film Material' is sad and reflective.
Protagonist and Antagonist
In the poem 'Ageing,' the protagonist is Ruth Fainlight as a speaker and the antagonist is ageing.
Major Conflict
The conflict in the poem 'Ageing' is between the protagonist and the process of ageing.
Climax
The climax of the poem 'The Storm' is 'I took the spade and being chief mourner, / made the first movement to bury you.'
Foreshadowing
The mention of 'letters,' in the poem 'Handbag' foreshadows the relationship between the speakers father and mother and the 'love' mentioned at the end of the poem.
Understatement
The phrase 'Insomnia under a mosquito net,' in the poem 'Agua de Colónia' is an understatement of the reality of sleeping whilst worrying about mosquitoes or feeling overwhelmed by heat.
Allusions
The line 'maybe because it's full moon,' in the poem 'Borrowed Time' alludes to the idea that people go crazy when it's a full moon, since the speaker says 'I feel a bit crazy tonight.'
Metonymy and Synecdoche
Throughout the poem 'Handbag,' the 'leather,' 'letters' and 'Coty powder,' represent 'womanliness, / and love, and anguish, and war,' as stated at the end of the poem.
Personification
In the poem 'The Knot,' the line 'words would form a knot and start a story,' is personifying the words, as they actively begin the story-telling process.
Hyperbole
The phrase 'reduced to the ludicrous,' in 'The Storm,' is hyperbolic because it exaggerates the situation.
Onomatopoeia
N/A
