Samantha Lowe
AP Literature
Mrs. Vogt
29 September 2010
“Mid-Term Break” by Seamus Heaney is a poem that deals with the death of a four year
old boy caused by an accident. Although this poem is narrated by a young boy, this tragic
poem actually is about Heaney’s younger brother Christopher. Throughout this poem
Heaney creates different techniques to interpret his mood.
In the beginning of the story the boy is isolated in the ominous “sick bay” of his
school. The boy starts to count the bells, but “knelling” suggest a funeral’s bell rather
than a bell for lessons. As this is occurring the narrator feels as if death itself might be
catching.
The boy is now in the porch where he met his father crying. The father is crying,
but according to the boy the father always took funerals in stride. The father, apparently
always strong at other’s funerals, is distraught by his child’s death. As Big Jim Evans
describes the ambiguous accident he meant to use a metaphorical “blow” to describe
what occurred.
During this verse the baby cooed and laughed and rocked the pram, because
Heaney takes the readers back to when his little brother was born and how he acted in
contrast to how everyone was feeling. Everyone felt sad and sorry for the boy as well as
his family. When the boy came in he felt embarrassed for the fact that he could not
understand why death would take this innocent child and who has yet experienced life
instead of him; considering the fact he was eldest. He also felt embarrassed when men
stood up to show his hand in grief which, most likely, made the situation worse.
The old men tell the speaker “sorry for his trouble”. The old men tell him this
because they feel sorrow for him. Strangers whispers to other’s informing that he is the
eldest and this adds to the tense atmosphere, because the speakers feels as if he should
have been there instead of away at school, especially when his mother came in to hold his
hand.
In verse five “mother” emphasizes how she reacted to the death of her son.
Instead of her being sad she was more frustrated or angry at the fact of what happened.
The word choice of “corpse” is used because when the body is returned late at night the
boy no longer see’s his brother has a person. “Stanched and bandaged” is used to describe
the corpse of Christopher. Considering the fact that the boy no longer see’s him as a
person he gives the corpse this some what negative description.
It is the next morning and the boy decides to visit his little brother’s room.
“Snowdrops and candles soothed the bedside” when literally they sooth Heaney. The
flowers are a symbol in the poem that symbols new life, after death. Heaney uses
personal pronouns such as “he” to describe his brother instead of the pervious word
“corpse”. He uses these pronouns because now his brother looks like himself. He has not
seen his brother in six weeks and now that he has the opportunity to see him he looks
alive. The speaker’s tone of this poem is austere, with the language dry, spare and
spartan, a good sound contrast to the densities of the nature poems; grief has restrained
the poet.
“Wearing” is used as a metaphor. The bruise is seen as not really apart of the boy,
as he is wearing it, as if it could come off. The bruise is described as poppy because
Heaney links it with death and helped soothed the pain. It makes us feel sorry because we
see how it affects the boy and what he has to deal with knowing that his brother has to
wear that poppy bruise. “He lay in the four foot box as in his cot” makes the readers even
sadder because we can picture the death of a four year old in a coffin; laying there as if he
were asleep in his own bed. We contrast the ugly “corpse, stanched and bandaged”,
which becomes a sleeping child with “no gaudy scars”-dead, but, ironically, not
disfigured.
I feel like the poem hit me deep with the last line as if I understood it better at the
end. “A four foot box, a foot for every year” is the last line of the poem which is most
poignant and skilful because the size of the coffin is measured of the child’s life. It was
shocking when I found out that the death was of a four year old. This last line of the
poem gives the poem in general impact and makes it stand out by using a rhyming
couplet. With the alliteration used such as the sniffling and weeping sounds, ties into the
mood of the poem and of the reader.
Overall this poem has a clear formal structure. The effect it has portrayed on me is
indescribable. The way Heaney writes makes the emotion come out of his poem. It makes
the reader feel how he is feeling; as if we were in the poem itself or right there when he
was writing it.