The poem
Somewhere on the other side of this wide night and the distance between us, I am thinking of you. The room is turning slowly away from the moon.
This is pleasurable. Or shall I cross that out and say it is sad? In one of the tenses I singing an impossible song of desire that you cannot hear.
La lala la. See? I close my eyes and imagine the dark hills I would have to cross to reach you. For I am in love with you
and this is what it is like or what it is like in words.
interesting poem, explores the intermingling of feelings of pleasure and sadness, evokes the sensation of disoreintation through contemplation of distance btween self and lover, the silted english suggests a foreign character or is this use of language a symptom of the confusion felt in expressing the sense of alienation and separation from their lover
Words, Wide Night is my favourite piece of poetry. You can sense both the loneliness and longing in it.
This poem shows how great Carol Ann Duffy's poetry is.
She expresses herself in a fantastic range of words, this has to be one of the best, you must agree!
When I first read this poem on its publication I recognised it as a powerful piece. However, now I am seperated by hundreds of miles from my lover, I understand its power. It is about confusion and longing and loneliness, yet makes all three beautiful. It's about the overwhelming and indescribable feeling of real love and this is what it is like or what it is like in words.
A short but strong piece. It displays a quality of loneliness and longing for the companionship of her lover. The poem perhaps also demonstrates the easy forfeiture to desire when one is in love and how this feeling of desire can be easily amplified through separation.
This poem is so powerful, it makes you want to fall in love. Though with few words and techinques in the poem, the poem is dramatic. Yes, you can sense loneliness and longing in this. I wish someone would send this to me, Duffy you have really touched on the emotion of love-i love this poem!
This poems follows, and breaks, the tradition of renaissance's sonnets such as Sonnet 89 in Astrophel and Stella by Sydney and Shakespeare's Sonnet XXVII. It breaks with the tradition for it is not clear if a man addresses it to a woman or viceversa (actually anyone could address this poem to his/her lover when he/she is far away)and it is not a sonnet, although the poems development is close to that of a sonnet,…
Read the whole commentThis poems follows, and breaks, the tradition of renaissance's sonnets such as Sonnet 89 in Astrophel and Stella by Sydney and Shakespeare's Sonnet XXVII. It breaks with the tradition for it is not clear if a man addresses it to a woman or viceversa (actually anyone could address this poem to his/her lover when he/she is far away)and it is not a sonnet, although the poems development is close to that of a sonnet, the first two verse paragraphs (as it is irregular they cannot be called stanzas) present the themes of the poem (solitud, longing for a distant lover, sleeplessness; just the same themes Shakespeare's sonnet deals with) the third verse paragraph develops that themes giving them a turn (lalalala; breaks with the language) and the las pargraph concludes it. Carol Ann Duffy is a great poet, may be the best of her generation; I'm glad she didn't trew it all away becoming Poet Laurate.
I read this poem and copied it down in my diary when I was 16, it had a very powerful impact on me then when I was studying Duffy's work but now that I am older (22) it appears even more profound. The words read like a string of conscious thought, without checking themselves and without artificially making an effort. My favourite part of the poem is the break between the second to last and last line.... 'for I am in love with you and this.....' 'is what it is like' - the lingering feeling inside when reading these two lines together and pausing in the middle encapsulates the true power of love. This is the work of a genius!
I recieved an audio from some one with this poem and have never forgotten
lost the audio so looked for it on computer and found made me so happyyes it is like being in love and stll lonely
powerfully simple
I read this poem the first time on a tube rude through london in 1990. It was posted on the wall of the train. I copied it down on my airline tucket in pencil. I would think of it weekly; still admiring its simple structure and playful tense play.