The Snake (Allegory)
The snake who appears in the final lines of the poem acts as a stand-in for the concept of evil and death generally. Clare explicitly compares him to the plague, a disease that spelled destruction for many families in the nineteenth century, before the invention of antibiotics. Given the strong Christian culture of nineteenth-century England, Clare was probably also thinking of the snake who tempts Eve in the Biblical story of the Garden of Eden. That snake was responsible for the introduction of death and suffering into the world, because God punishes Adam and Eve for their disobedience by expelling them from paradise and taking away their immortality. The yellowhammer’s little paradise is similarly violated by the snake that arrives and brings death.
Pastoral Imagery (Motif)
Pastoral poetry depicts a fantasy of idyllic rural life. It is partially characterized by allusions to pretty aspects of the natural world like streams, sunshine, flowers, and singing birds. In “The Yellowhammer’s Nest,” Clare combines these tropes with a more attentive and idiosyncratic depiction of the natural world. The pebbly brook in the opening of the poem, and the “flowery weeds,” “joys of song,” and “happy home of sunshine, flowers and streams” are all distinctly pastoral. By interspersing these tropes with his more realistic descriptions, Clare suggests that they are part of the truth of the countryside, although not the whole truth.
