AlGandeel
Faisal
English_Grade 11/B
September 7, 2012
The Identification
The Poem talks about a father identifying his son in a mortuary who has died in a bomb
explosion. The father was in shock and he could barely believe the death of his son until the
clues shows that is his son. The Mood in this poem is tragic because as a parent it’s sorrowful
seeing your son’s dead body. The poet uses a lot of elements to make this an effective poem, he
used imagery in many important spots. When the poet mentioned the hair as “Burnt black The
father figured out that it is burnt at the explosion. In the second stanza “ the mask of charred
wood”, the reader imagins a face with blisters and wooden points sticking out of a child’s face.
The “ Cigarettes” had a huge nominal meaning for the reader and the father himself, I don’t
think that any father would like to know his son is smoking or doing anything bad for himself.
Metaphor is the second most important element in this poem. When Roger Mcgough mentioned
“ the mask of charred wood” the reader can feel the father’s fear about it really becoming his
son. The father also said “ Pull out every splinter of hope” to try to prove himself wrong and that
the body was not his son’s.
Repetition was an important element in the poem as well. The name “ Stephen “ was
mentioned five times unexpectedly not in the second stanza in which he started looking at the
details of the body. In the second stanza the word “face” was repeated three times to emphasize
his changed a scarred face, his face was so terrifying that even his own father had trouble
recognizing him. The word “that” is mentioned ten times especially at the end of the poem. At
that point the father is forced to accept his son’s death.
AlGandeel
The final element was Irony. Irony had a huge impact of the effectiveness in this poem
especially when the father said “ Then this must be him “ but started thinking about the
“Cigarettes” to avoid the tough reality of his son’s death. Then saying “ That’s him- That’s our
Stephen “ which means it is typical of him helping other people and getting into problems
himself.
The poet cleverly piles detail upon detail to convince the reader, if not the father, that this
is definitely Stephen. However, what the details also show is that the relationship between father
and son must have been a distant one in which the father showed no love or affection for Stephen
while he was alive, any more than he does now that he is dead. This is a beautiful poem because
of the poets amazing use of these tools and elements. These elements help the reader visualize
and understand the poem in a better way, which helps him feel the poet’s feeling in that situation.
“All good poetry is the spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings.