Narrator, “Bright Copper Kettles”
The narrator of this poem divulges the secret to coping with his grief, having lost several loved ones that were close to him. He reveals that these lost individuals speak to him in his dreams; they are friendly and they speak to him with compassion and joy . As a result, the narrator has taken to sleeping at every possible moment, so as to catch a glimpse of those individuals he is no longer able to see in real life. In this way, the narrator is spiraling deeper and deeper into a state of depression, during which he uses sleep as a way to cope with his immense loss.
Loved Ones, “Bright Copper Kettles”
Little is known about the men and women that have driven the narrator into his deep sorrow and depression. They are simply referred to as friends, who have returned to visit the narrator in his dreams. According to the narrator, these fictional figures are far more compassionate, friendly, and one-dimensional than their real-world counterparts. They are arguably the reason for the narrator’s descent into grief and depression, as their appearances in his dreams have driven the narrator to sleeping all the time, in a desperate attempt to see and communicate with them.
Narrator, “Sequence”
The narrator of this poem is a casual yet omniscient observer; he reports on the different stages of the afterlife and offers his opinion of these steps in the sequence. From the narrator’s perspective, Hell is reserved for a select few individuals—for those who are truly evil and wicked to their core. Most humans, the narrator concludes, likely exist in some stage of purgatory—neither completely good nor completely bad. Heaven on earth is rarely achieved by us humans and, in fact, is often reserved for animals, whose souls are pure.
Man, “Sequence”
Little is known about the man that is featured in the second and third parts of this poem. The man, along with his female counterpart, exist in poverty. He eventually winds up in jail, though it is implied that his crime was petty and not violent nor murderous. The man is not a bad man, but simply a man who has made and continues to make poor choices. In this way, he is symbolic of the majority of greater humanity, in which we all make mistakes and demonstrate poor judgement.
Woman, “Sequence”
The woman in this poem is depicted as being more purposefully evil and wicked than the man she is in a relationship with. As with many of us, the woman has different sides to her personality—both good and bad. At times, she would be brave and nurturing; at others, she would be cruel and vicious. As with the man, the woman’s prospects ultimately fail when, after escaping to Los Angeles, she was unable to break into the world of celebrity.
