Poetry Group
Question:
thebrainer
Student
High School - 9th Grade
I need help on a literature essay on "The is the Dark Time of My Love".
A) Say who is the oppresors in the poem and describe what they do.
B) What makes the oppresors mysterious?
C) How does the writer create a sense of horror or other unpleasant feelings in the reader?
Answers:
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kc4u Teacher
College - SenioreNotes Editor
Posted by kc4u on Monday November 9, 2009 at 11:00 PMMartin Carter was Guyanese poet of mixed European origin who wrote right in the middle of the Wars and was also a life-long activist. He is known, primarily for his political poetry.
This poem however intermingles the personal and the political quite brilliantly. It is meant to be an ironic and sardonic love poem, which problematizes love in the time of such ruins--oppression, cruelty and surveillance.
The poem is addressed to the beloved almost in the form of a murmur. The Big Brother seems to be watching. The landscape is potentially a romantic one, but it is being gnawed by the forces of destruction. The crawling brown beetles, the sunless sky, the 'awful sorrow' of the drooped red flowers all create a sombre mood.
As the poet says, we become aware of the war allegory
--"It is the season of oppression, dark metal, and tears.
It is the festival of guns, the carnival of misery."The dark metal, the gun underscore this inhuman carnival of raw power which can only bring tears for mankind. There is an absolute reign of anxiety everywhere.
The last stanza describes the arrival of the agent of death who is seen as a destroyer of dreams. The 'boot of steel' is a clear indication of the person being a war-personnel. He kills the beloved's dream of love as she keeps sleeping.
The poem may well be seen as a dying or a dead soldier's sad voice addressed to his beloved, far away from the front, in her sleep, dreaming of his return and the prospects of love.
