Poppies (Jane Weir poem) Literary Elements

The first-person speaker is the mother addressing her son.

There is no specific form or meter; the poem uses free verse. The four stanzas are of varying lengths (six, eleven, twelve, and six lines respectively).

Metaphors:

"spasms of paper red" (Line 5).
The poppies are metaphorically described as a red spasm, which evokes violent imagery and connects the poppies to war.

"a blockade / of yellow bias" (Line 6)
The yellow pattern on the son's blazer is compared to a blockade, suggesting the wartime context of the poem.

"the gelled / blackthorns of your hair." (Lines 15-16)
The son's hair is described as "blackthorns," evocatively demonstrating that the mother feels she cannot touch it.

"an ornamental stitch" (Line 34)
The dove is described as an ornamental stitch. This metaphor represents both the beauty of the mother and son's relationship (the "ornamental" quality of the dove shows its beauty and aesthetics), but continues the underlying symbolism of violence and warfare by referring to a "stitch," which could refer to the stitching of a wound.

Similes:

"the world overflowing / like a treasure chest." (Line 20-21)
By comparing the outside world to a treasure chest, Weir indicates the son's excitement to explore outside of his home (and possibly to go to war).

"leaned against it like a wishbone." (Line 32)
The war memorial is compared to a "wishbone," conveying the mother's sense of hope and longing that her son is safe.

"bias binding around your blazer." (Line 6)
Repetition of the "b" sound

smoothed down your shirt's" (Line 9)
Repetition of the "s" sound

The son is excited and eager because he feels that his life is opening up and beginning, which is ironic because his mother fears the opposite is true.

Modern poetry, war poetry.

United Kingdom. More specifically, the poem is set at a house in an apparently rural or semi-rural area, near a hill containing a church and a graveyard.

Melancholy, fearful, tender, reflective.

The mother (the speaker) is the protagonist. The antagonist in this poem is a situation rather than a person; the fact that her son is going to war and the devastation of war more broadly.

The central conflict in the poem is the mother's struggle to say goodbye to her son and grapple with her emotions as he leaves home. The broader conflict in the poem is the harm caused by war.

The climax of the poem occurs in Lines 24-21, when the son leaves home, which appears to occur in a "split second" that marks the boundary between the mother's anxieties, and the realization of those fears as the son truly departs from home. The emotion that accompanies this climax is symbolically marked by the mother releasing the songbird from its cage.

When she pins the poppy to her son's lapel, the mother is foreshadowing the possibility that he might be killed on the battlefield like the men he is commemorating.

The reference to graves may also foreshadow the son's death.

The mother understates her own feelings about her son becoming a soldier. She deliberately represses her emotions and is silent, her words "turned into felt" (Line 17).

World War I is referred to symbolically a number of times, for example, through the reference to Armistice Sunday, the pinning of a commemorative poppy, and the mother's visit to the war memorial.

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"my stomach busy / making tucks, darts, pleats" (Lines 27-28)
The stomach is personified as being "busy," like a human occupied with a task.

"All my words / flattened, rolled" (Lines 16-17)
The words are personified as rolling, like a human making a movement.

"A split second / and you were away, intoxicated." (Lines 21-22)
The reference to a "split second" is a hyperbole. While the son's departure almost certainly took longer than a single second, it seemed to occur instantaneously to the mother because of her own fear and heightened emotion surrounding the moment.

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