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Post by jordan on Aug 27, 2017 7:33:26 GMT -6
I think the relationship in "When You Go Away" is or was not stable. Maybe the speaker and his love disagreed a lot, and they are no longer together. This poem I believe is more about the speaker reaction after they split apart. The tone is very gloomy and guilty. The speaker says that the "wind clicks around to the north." I felt that that meant the air around him had gotten colder or is non-existent. Lines 2 and 3 of the first stanza about the painters represent how he works all day to keep from thinking about them, but as the day ends and the "paint falls showing the black walls", he is back feeling distraught. He keeps rethinking the same hour of their last moments together.
When he woke up in the "bed of ashes" in the second stanza, I'm not sure, but I think he feels like he has died. He stills feel guilty because he believes he is the "reason". When I read the line that says he was "falling", I thought the speaker might feel so guilty that he chose to kill himself He describes his words as clothing or a "garment" of what he'll never be and compared it to the "tucked sleeve of a one-armed boy". At first, I thought he meant that he wouldn't be whole again. A part of him is missing now that his love is gone, but I'm don't see the connection between those two lines.
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Post by andrea on Aug 29, 2017 11:42:15 GMT -6
In "When You Go Away", I believe that the author is describing how he feels when his love goes away, which would explain the title of the poem. The first line implies that he feels cold when his love is not with him, since it's very cold in the north. The second and third lines imply that he feels empty, considering that without the paint the wall is bare, or empty. The fourth and fifth lines imply that he feels as if time has stopped without her. Overall, the entire first stanza describes how he feels when his love is gone, whether it momentarily or permanently, through the use of imagery, possibly even metaphors.
As for the second stanza, I was confused about whether he was talking about having a nightmare that wakes him up every night, possibly in the middle of the night, or during "the time when the beards of the dead get their growth." This could also just be a saying meant to mean the dead of night, which is also known as the middle of the night. If this stanza is about a nightmare, then I'm assuming that the nightmare is of him falling.
The last three lines make me think that he believes that he's the reason his love left him and that he believes that no matter what he tells her, his words will be useless, must like the sleeve on a shirt worn by a one-armed boy.
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Post by Keviana S on Aug 30, 2017 11:46:41 GMT -6
In "When you go away," I agree with both Andrea and Jordan. Furthermore, The speaker can be best identified as lost and aggravated, because he is lonely. He describes his feelings of his forgotten love. In the first stanza it helps me understand he has to eventually move on and that is why he is talking about North. He is also talking about time. It probably will take years or even minutes for his love to not be there. When he is talking about the painters work day and how the clock is going back to the striking hour it helps me understand that time never stops. I also think of this in a deep sense that he is not too happy when he or she goes away, because he is creating a vivid image that is telling how the walls are black. When I think of something being black, I think of it as dark and maybe secretive. There probably were secrets in the relationship which made his love go away. I say that black can be referred as being dark, because when it is night outside, It is black and very dark. I also think the he probably feels as if the relationship had=s died, because it says "At night wrapped in the bed of ashes." Ashes make me think that something has been destroyed or is already and the death phase.
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taj
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Post by taj on Aug 30, 2017 16:02:54 GMT -6
One must remember not to generalize the relationship between the speaker and his lover. The speaker perhaps feels very complicated in his love not due to his dislike of them, but his conflicting feelings that emerge when in deep thought. Merwin's imagery of paint falling to reveal black walls is much like an illusion being cleared up. When he is not near his lover, the illusion of his perfect love falls apart bit by bit. Line 4 and 5 implies that the speaker sees the time without his lover as meaningless. This means that the speaker does indeed have a genuine love for their lover, which gives nuance to their feelings about their lover. Merwin then reveals that he places blame for his feelings in himself in stanza 2. Merwin states on lines 4-5 of stanza 2, "I remember that I am falling. That I am the reason." Merwin indicates that he is the reason that he is "falling" or in emotional turmoil. With his final two lines, Merwin acknowledges the futility of his attempt at voicing his woes by comparing it to a boy with one arm's tucked sleeves, where the effort of looking nice is wasted through the simple fact that the boy cannot make the most of it due to his missing arm.
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Post by kristin18 on Aug 31, 2017 10:36:33 GMT -6
I took a big interest into this poem because I am a sucker for romance. I especially agree with Andrea and Jordan for the romance aspect. This poem's tone is very blameworthy and cold.. almost pitiful. The first line I believe is to be talking about the warmness and life that his lover gave him, however now that the lover is gone, he feels the "click" of his cold loneliness. In the next 4 lines he describes a work day and how the day keeps moving and the clock still runs. This can mean that he feels everyday without her, it's the same boring day and night without her. The rhythm is slow falling in line to the longing hours he has without her.
He then starts to talk about nights when he knows there is no one next to him. Maybe of a nightmare like Andrea said with no one next to him when he wakes from it for comfort. Him being the "reason" gives him the blame for messing up his relationship with his lover.
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Post by Kevin Beeler on Aug 31, 2017 11:00:50 GMT -6
As Taj said the poem "When You Go Away" discusses the difficult and contradictory feeling that speaker has for his lover. However, I would disagree with his illusion idea because I think it is more that he is building a wall to keep out his feelings or trying to paint over them in line 2, and that the paint falling of the walls is that it is a reference to an object or memory that causes him to bring those feeling back to the surface. And the clock striking the same hour is how the memory keeps him in the past or how the relationship kept him in the past not being able to move on to the next hour. Yet in the second stanza he seems to come to a realization that it is actually himself that is keeping himself in the past and not moving forward saying “ I am the reason”.
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Post by akmaples on Aug 31, 2017 14:32:33 GMT -6
Looking at the poem’s prompt, I gathered information about the poem. This information includes the writer, being the speaker, his love, being his lover or the person that loved him in the past, as well as himself, himself being his consciousness and his thoughts. The task of prompt being to describe the compicated relationshop between these three characters and explain ythe speaker’s tone then tells me that I should be reading the following poem ready to decipher how the speaker is feeling towards what he is writing about.
The title of the poem is “When You Go Away”, this makes me think he is talking about his lover and that the poem may be about how the speaker feels when “you” or his lover leaves him, him being the speaker or himself, being his conscious. The next thing is the poet, “William Stanley Merwin”, I think this may be the speaker, because the speaker is usually also the poet.
In the second line, when the speaker says, “The painters work all day but at sundown the paint falls.” The painters represent him and his lover doing everything they can to keep their relationship afloat. When the paint falls, I think of their relationship just not working out all and no matter what they do, their relationship just isn’t meant to be.
In the third line, when the speaker says, ‘black walls’ the word ‘black’ has negative connotations with it whenever someone uses it. When you think of the word black, you may think of negativity, lonesomeness, dark, depressing etc. The black walls are supposed to be significantly the speaker’s loneliness because of his failing relationship with his lover.
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Post by nikymbaw on Aug 31, 2017 15:31:13 GMT -6
When I read poem I came to a similar conclusion as Jordan and Andrea. I feel that the speaker is dealing with the lost of his lover, and that is taking a hard and slow toll on him emotionally and mentally. The lines “The painter's work all day but at sundown the paints falls” and “The clock goes back to striking the same hour”, reminds me of a constant and numbing daily grind that the speaker must be experience now that his lover is gone. It gives a sense of bitter regret throughout the poem, something that only becomes more noticeable in the next stanza. I also find the way he describes being “...at night wrapped in the bed of ashes” being reminisce of aging, the ashes possibly signifying how long his lover has been gone and how he’s rotting away by himself.
Then when he says “...the beards of the dead get their growth// I remember that I am falling// That I am the reason//” indicates that time is passing and that they blame themselves for their love leaving in the first place. It’s a very dark, and depression sight, one that no doubt has made his emotions all muddle and swim together in an never ending spiral.
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mari
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Posts: 13 
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Post by mari on Sept 1, 2017 10:27:21 GMT -6
"The wind clicks around the north." Was a very strong line. The word clicks had a strong, ugly emphasis on that made it seem as though there was gonna be more anger than sorrow in this poem.It seemed to me that the speaker was frustrated over her leaving and angry at himself for what he had done. "Remember that I am falling, that I am the reason." Maybe he is talking directly to the girl, reminding her that maybe he told her before that he was struggling with something. Now that she has left he's making an excuse saying he warned her.
I also feel as though the reader may be claiming that the girl leaving would be useless. I got this from line two when he says "The painters work all day, but at sundown the paint falls. In other words maybe her leaving is useless because she'll just end up coming right back again.
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Post by nayaj0nes on Sept 17, 2017 14:41:16 GMT -6
In "When You Go Away" the author is highlighting the author's longing for his lover. It is obvious that he is taking this hard because he feels like what he wants would never come back to him. His reference to paint falling off a black wall to me meant that being without his lover is somewhat similar to being dead. He feels as though he has no place with his lover, but he also feels as though him saying this does not help his situation at all, because “his words” are what he will “never be”. I found the comparison to a “one armed” boy confusing because he seems to be comparing himself without a lover to a boy wishing for an arm. The speaker's tone is very dark and depressing because he is wishing for his lover to come back to him. I feel like the speaker is trying to say that he is dead without his lover and that he has no purpose in life other than to be with his lover because that is the only thing that satisfies him. The speaker makes this relationship complicated because he feels like there is nothing he can do to bring his lover back to him.
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