Horses

1. Horses Edwin muir By: Michael, Lexy, Adrian, Rohan

2. Stanza 1 Contrast Lumbering means staggering or walking in an awkward way. Suggest the how tiring the horses’ work is. Thoselumbering horses in the steady plough, On the barefield– I wonder, why just now, They seemed terrible, so wild and strange, Like magic poweron the stony grange. Imagery Gives an image of a bare, plain and uncultivated field. Rule of Three Imagery Gives an image of a farm building, giving the reader more ideas about the farm’s structure Simile Describe horses as magic, giving the poem a sense of mystery

3. Stanza 2 Contrast Childish and fear doesn’t go well together suggest strange and unknown events approaching Perhaps some childish hourhas come again, When I watchedfearful, through the blackeningrain. The hooves like pistons in an ancient mill Move up and down, yet seem as standing still. Connotation Describes the rain as black, connotes a heavy storm Imagery Adds another image of a farm structure Enjambment To fully emphasize the horses seamlessly and restlessly shuffling Simile Describes how to horses shuffle their legs when they stand still detaily.

4. Stanza 3 Connotes: Dominance, power, personification (hooves don’t conquer, also refers to eating up with speed, power etc.) Their bodies were brilliant, beautiful and angelic Their conquering hooves which trod the stubble down Were ritual that turned the field to brown, And their great hulks were seraphim of gold, Or mute ecstatic monsters in the mould. juxtaposition Alliteration helps to give the sense of machinery due to repetitive sound (machines repeat same process over and over) again taking their true nature away. Ritual connotes machinery, both words take their true nature away from them. Or they were quie, blissful demons that were in the mould.

5. Stanza 4 Struggling snakes personification makes the reader understand the effort put into creating each furrow and the use of the word rapture (joy) shows that each one is a celebration so effort is need to produce these. And oh the rapture, when one furrow done, They marched broad breasted into the sinking sun! The light flowed off their bossy sides in flakes; The furrows rolled behind like struggling snakes. Anaphora, repetition again gives sense of a systematic way of doing something, alliteration also does this (bb, ss, ss) Personification (sides aren’t bossy and furrows aren’t struggling snakes. Also gives dominance to the horses by using adjective that connotes power.

6. Stanza 5 But when at dusk with steaming nostrils home They came, they seemed gigantic in the gloam. And warm and glowing with mysterious fire That lit their smouldering bodies in the mire. Rhyme scheme: a a b b Power imagery and its effect Connotation

7. Stanza 6 Simile Their eyes as brilliant and wide as night Gleamed with a cruel apocalypticlight. Their manes the leaping ire of the wind Lifted with rage invisible and blind. Juxtaposition Personification Great and Menacing

8. Stanza 7 Childhood memories fading. Ah, now it fades! It fades! And I must pine Again for that dread country crystalline, Where the black field and the still-standing tree Were bright and fearful presences to me. Fear Almost describing life Imagery Fearful of horses.

9. Thank you