"And out beyond the tomato stake patch of
the yachts, with their orange lights; leaving
this tuberous small bay for the city across an
empty dark"
metaphor in the tomato stake
patch of yachts
orange lights, the colour
being associated with
warmth
the bay is small, warm and
welcoming - the city large,
empty and dark
"..the longer white lights feel
nervously about in the
blackness, towards here, like
hands after the light switch"
anxiosness is seen in the way the
person in the poem sees the lights
moving -"nervously". Also uncertainty
Simile, like hands after a
light switch
trembling of the lights from
the ripples of the water
"I'll lose sight of the ferry soon -
I can see it while it's on
darkness, and it seems
honeycomb, filled as it is with
yellow light."
anxiousness in losing sight of the ferry.
juxtaposition in the light of the ferry on the darkness
the light of the ferry is described as being yellow,
and compared to honeycomb. Honeycomb and the
colour yellow are associated with warmth, and these
are the feelings that Gray evokes in his reader
Japanese Story
"There's nothing sick about
death - it's life. Your problem
is you think it can be avoided,
but it can't."
"Even when you're
here you're not really
here."
Robert Gray - Flame and Dangling Wire
"A sour smoke is hauled out
everywhere, thin, like rope"
Gray evokes the senses - like smell -
in the reader as well as emotions
alliteration, sour smoke
rhyming in smoke and rope
"And we come to a landscape of tin cans, of cars like skulls, that is
rolling in its sand dune shapes"
similes and metaphors
emulating natural, beautiful settings; which serves to only make it uglier
death, represented in the skulls. ugly imagery
"And standing where I se the mirage of the city I realise I am in the future. This is how it shall be after men have gone. It will be made of things
that worked
person is in the future, metaphorically speaking
past tense adds to the revelation
"...I notice an old radio, that spills its dangling wire - and I realise that somehwere the voices it
received are still travelling..."
Even though the radio has died, its transmissions continue to exist
the world continues on after death. death is a part of life.
metaphor in the travelling voices
"spills its dangling wire" -personifies the radio, makes it feel like a person with their guts hanging out of their stomach