The poem
Out of the church she followed them With a lofty step and mien: His bride was like a village maid, Maude Clare was like a queen.
"Son Thomas, " his lady mother said, With smiles, almost with tears: "May Nell and you but live as true As we have done for years;
"Your father thirty years ago Had just your tale to tell; But he was not so pale as you, Nor I so pale as Nell."
My lord was pale with inward strife, And Nell was pale with pride; My lord gazed long on pale Maude Clare Or ever he kissed the bride.
"Lo, I have brought my gift, my lord, Have brought my gift, " she said: To bless the hearth, to bless the board, To bless the marriage-bed.
"Here's my half of the golden chain You wore about your neck, That day we waded ankle-deep For lilies in the beck:
"Here's my half of the faded leaves We plucked from the budding bough, With feet amongst the lily leaves, - The lilies are budding now."
He strove to match her scorn with scorn, He faltered in his place: "Lady, " he said, - "Maude Clare, " he said, - "Maude Clare, " — and hid his face.
She turn'd to Nell: "My Lady Nell, I have a gift for you; Though, were it fruit, the blooms were gone, Or, were it flowers, the dew.
"Take my share of a fickle heart, Mine of a paltry love: Take it or leave it as you will, I wash my hands thereof."
"And what you leave, " said Nell, "I'll take, And what you spurn, I'll wear; For he's my lord for better and worse, And him I love Maude Clare.
"Yea, though you're taller by the head, More wise and much more fair: I'll love him till he loves me best, Me best of all Maude Clare.
maude clare
From my understanding, Maude Clare has sex with the Lord and then he marries Nell instead but he still has feelings for Maude Clare, and Nell knows this.
The poem has 3 different narrators, and three different points of view in the poem.
The poem First Love
The poem First Love by John Clare is a poem about a young man who is struck by the insetne and immense feelings of love, infatuation and other mixed feelings for the first time. In the beginning of the poem, the author explains the first moment of his awestruck love. In lines 6 to 8, the author gives us the physical effect of love. These symptoms gives to the reader that the man was physically unable to move due to…
Read the whole commentThe poem First Love by John Clare is a poem about a young man who is struck by the insetne and immense feelings of love, infatuation and other mixed feelings for the first time. In the beginning of the poem, the author explains the first moment of his awestruck love. In lines 6 to 8, the author gives us the physical effect of love. These symptoms gives to the reader that the man was physically unable to move due to the intensity of the love hitting him, leaving him paralyzed. In line 8, he explains how his environment had turn into ‘clay’. This could possibly be a metaphor on how his life is easily ‘sculpted’ or ‘modified’ by the woman he loves. Then, right after line 8, the young man has returned from his ‘dream’, and ‘blood rushed to his face’, meaning he’s starting to blush. The line, ‘ And took my eyesight quite away’ shows that he could not see anything else but her and was metaphorically blind. Unfortunately, the last 8 lines of the poem broke the feeling of love in his heart. In the last 8 lines, the author explains about how the young man has fallen back to his reality and faces the fact that the girl would not feel the same.He conveys the effect of love and shock by the usage of similes and metaphors in several lines. His other method of conveying this emotion is by rhyming and constantly ending every 2 lines with the same sound. This makes the reader feel a bit delightful and optimistic due to the melody the rhyming has created. By reusing the phrase, “I never saw so sweet a face†in the poem, the writer uses it in the beginning to give us the first impression of the girl when he first sees her and tells the reader that he still continues to think the same after he is back to reality although more on a melancholic tone.