Before You Were Mine by Carol Ann Duffy Essay

Before you were mine is a poem writ ecstasy by a daughter about how she imagines her arrives life history ten years before the daughter was born. The author describes the photo of her mother with two of her friends. They shriek at the paving and seem to be sharing a joke, young and lightsome (line 4). She knows that the thought of having a child atomic number 53 day doesnt occur to her mother when she was young and had a lot of dreams. Now remembering her take childhood, Duffy thinks of how she used to play with her mothers red shoes and imagines when her mother might have wasted them.She remembers how her mother used to teach her dance steps when she was a little fille. The poem is a tetrad stanza one, each stanza being made up of five lines, with some variation in length of line. The frontmost two stanzas focus purely on the life of the mother before the daughter was born, whilst the third stanza opens with a reference to the daughters birth and then moves to the daughters vision of her mother in her earlier life, thus providing a link with the previous stanzas.The fourth stanza begins with a recollection from the daughters younger life with her mother, and then takes us back once again to the mothers old age of dancing. I consider that the language contributes to the mood of the poem. The poem is written in first person write up voice. There are many references to her mother as very happy you laugh / the bold girl winking in Portobello, you sparkle and waltz and laugh(lines 13-15). The authors mothers life can be perceived as flashy.Her mother is likened to Marilyn Monroe Your polka-dot dress blows round your legs. Marilyn (line 5). Duffys mother dreams of fizzy, delineation tomorrows (line 7). The poem is written in the present tense, as if the events of the photo are happening now. I recollect in this way the poet tries to make her mothers past as real as possible. It seems spunky to read a poem in which a daughter imagines how full of life an d fun her mother must have been before she was born.Her admiration of her mother is shown in a direct way, and words much(prenominal) as shriek, sparkle and fizzy image the carelessness of youth. Throughout, the poet is very possessive of her mother. References to her appear forever and a day Im ten years away , Im not here til now , I remember (lines 1, 6 and 12). The word mine appears in the title and the poem actually concludes with the aforementioned(prenominal) words as the title, as if the poet is locking her mother in a firm embrace of words.