Catrin by Gillian Clarke
Storyboard Text
- "I can remember you child"
- "Our first fierce confrontation"
- "Still I am fighting you off, as you stand there"
- First person, direct address present the poem as autopbiographical and introduces ideas of a parent/child relationship and memory.
- "As you stand there with your straight, strong, long bown hair and your rosy defiant glare"
- Semantic field across both stanzas of a battle, war-like - confrontation, fierce, fought, struggle, tank, fighting plus the metaphor "tight red rope of love" tug of war, a tight rope, the umbilical cord, bond. "First" suggests one of many.
- "bringing up from the heart's pool that old rope, tightening about my life"
- The nostaligic tone established by reminicing in the first stanza is now replaced by a switch to present tense in the second. We now get to the reason for looking back at the birth of her daughter.
- "as you ask may you skate in the dark for one more hour"
- Alliteration of 'st' , the repetition of 'ong' and the rhyme of 'there', 'hair' and 'glare' to create a rhythm emphasise her daughter's actions as an individual force, her strength and desire to be independent.
- "Pool" suggests the depth of her parental love while "rope" again refers to the metaphor from stanza one, showing that, whilst physically detached, is still a strong ,emotional connection as she reminisces.
- The reason for the reminiscing and the conflict is finally explained. If it had been at the beginning of the poem it may have seemed trivial but after hearing the mother's thoughts, we realise and empathise with her motherly concerns as she tries to protect a child reaching for indepedence.
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