Poem/title Themes Language Structure Tone Form
analysis
Eat Me Gender ‘When I hit thirty, he brought me a cake’ – Final stanza Apathetic – ‘I 10 stanzas of
Imperative – Abuse subverts relatable diction, forthright, caesura sets all three lines didn’t taste 3 lines each
controlling, Relationships up conflict between ‘I’ and ‘he’ end stopped it’ Isometric –
predatory Control ‘Didn’t even taste it’ – absence of pleasure, short – reassertion Mournful – three lines of
Monosyllables Power sentence, emphasises the complete control of her
of control ‘my only equal length
impact dynamics senses
Alice in Insecurity ‘The bigger the better, he’d say…’ – use of
All but stanza pleasure’ – each
Wonderland – Greed comparative adjectives – greed – tricolon and 6 are end- Insecure/ containing
manipulation of Objectificatio repetitive ‘girls’ – objectification, demonstratives stopped angry – ‘too same (ish)
senses n and plurals – more than one victim 3 fat’ number of
Aging/time ‘Or a beached whale on a king-size bed / craving a Chronological Defiant – syllables
Desire/sex wave’ – language of fatphobia within society, – follows ‘how could I
gendered sexuality ‘king-size’, liquid imagery trajectory of not’
throughout poem – perpetual thirst/absence of narrative
freedom Direct
‘Too fat…’ – anaphora, insecurity/societal quotations –
perception, rising frustration/anger
tone shift
‘He said, Open wide, poured olive oil down my
throat’ – sexuality subverted, tactility –
discomfort, olive oil as a the most essential
symbol of what is unhealthy, child-like phrasing -
imperative
‘There was nothing else left in the house to eat’ –
ominous final line, disturbing, forces the reader to
question the ethics, finishes with eat – surrounded
by need for food, disturbing but appropriate
revenge
Chainsaw vs Nature ‘It seemed an unlikely match. All winter end stop at Helplessness Free verse
Pampas Human unplugged,…’ – opening line, caesura sets up the end of – ‘I looked on 8 stanzas –
Conflict set up violence conflict, short sentence impactful, each stanza – from the differing
as integral to Gender antagonistic, sets up masculine sexual an attempt upstairs lengths –
the poem – Discriminati aggression to assert window like Warrior???
particularly on ‘I trailed the day-glo orange power line…’ long human the midday Heroic?
between nature Passage of run on sentence – tedium and anticlimax, control moon’ Cyclical
and man-made time colour symbolism – human obtrusiveness and framed by Tedium – Heterometric
Mundanity warning – insertion of ‘I’ time ‘then cut and
Conflict ‘The chainsaw with its bloody desire, its sweet descriptive of , raked, cut
, Desire tooth’ – personification, dissociation from the a singular and raked’
speaker, danger of manmade – battle event Methodical –
between man and technology and nature use of long ‘from there’
‘The pampas grass with its ludicrous feathers’ sentences ‘then’
– symbolic femininity, syntactically parallels describing Aggression –
the chainsaw, antithetical symbols, ‘ludicrous’ tedious ‘It seemed an
insulting/mocking methodology unlikely
‘overkill’ – caesura completely undermines – slows the match’
the violence pace of the Frustrated –
‘Like cutting at water or air with a knife’ – use poem ‘to try and
of simile exposes human’s inconsequentiality emphasises forget’
on nature, foolishness of action, again the Sadistic –
establishes feminine vs masculine anticlimax ‘bloody
‘By June / it was riding high in its saddle, desire’
wearing a new crown. / Corn in Egypt’ – Tongue in
victory for nature, passage of time cheek/ironic –
emphasises the ephemerality of humanity ‘overkill’
against nature, biblical reference – Mock heroism
justified/holy about nature, entirely superior – ‘I let it flare,
to man lifted it into
‘The seamless urge to persist was as far as it the sun’
got.’ Cyclical, violence begets violence, ‘man-
made dreams’ – cynical hypallage,
emphasises the speaker/humanity’s
culpability – ‘urge’ – sexuality
The Gun – Violence ‘Bringing a gun into a house / changes it.’ – Enjambment Accusatory – Free verse
monosyllabic, Gender ambiguous ‘it’, foreshadowing, simple verbs – inevitable ‘your hands Imposition of
laconic, ‘the’ – Death ‘gun’ and ‘house’ juxtaposition of violence progression reek of gun short stanzas
pivotal, cold Nature and domesticity of violence – oil and – ‘a gun
and obtrusive, Humanity ‘You lay it on the kitchen table / stretched out adds impact entrails’ brings a
introduction of Love like something dead’ – direct address ‘you’ – = ‘shot’ – Disengaged/ house alive’ –
violence – Sex accusatory – separation from personal guilt – end-focussed narrative = bullet/impact
Chekov’s gun Beauty? provides a sense of conflict between speaker powerful ‘at first it’s ful and
(it must go off) and the gun-owner – personification words – just practice disruptive
– builds tension ‘stretched out’ – merging of life and death, impact to Active – End-stopped
lazy? poem? ‘excited’ – control
‘The long metal barrel / casting a grey shadow Mostly active Four stanzas?
, / on the green-checkered cloth’ – phallic complex participles
imagery – gendered conflict – colour sentences Sadistic –
symbolism – man’s effect on nature/the home contrasted ‘entrails’
– ‘shadow’ ominous with short
‘Then a rabbit shot / clean through the head’- sentences
monosyllabic ‘clean through…’ – ironic Repetition of
sanitisation of violence, volta – violence is idea of gun
realised, end of building suspense/tension – and house –
rabbit as symbolic of spring and joy central
‘there’s a spring / in your step; your eyes division/confli
gleam / like when sex was fresh / A gun brings ct
the house alive’ – semantic field of Increasingly
spring/life/hope – ‘spring’ ‘gleam’ ‘fresh’ macabre -
‘alive’ – awakening, ironic life provided by unrealistic
death/violence – past tense ‘was fresh’ –
difficulties/mundanity in relation – conflation
of sex and violence
‘I join in the cooking: jointing / and slicing,
stirring and tasting’ – insertion of ‘I’ –
personal complicity – exaggerated by the
excessive active participles – community
provided by violence
‘The King of Death…out of the winter woods /
his black mouth / sprouting golden crocuses’ –
mythological – awe and beauty, common
story of history – ‘king’ exaggerates gendered
divisions/hierarchy – alliterative ‘winter
woods’ – conflation of life and death – colour
symbolism ‘black’ and ‘golden’ – beauty from
death
Genetics – Love ‘My father’s in my fingers, but my mother’s in Rhyme and Sentimental – Villanelle –
scientific Inheritance my palms’ – excessive repetition of half rhyme – ‘but in me mirroring –
terminology, Family possessive pronoun ‘my’ – personal identity – pairs and they touch inheritance
idea of Religion consonance – impact – unity? – repeated unity – one where fingers Tercets until
inheritance, Sex motif of hands – tactility, intimacy, personal – mismatched link to palms’ last stanza –
continuation of Parental balanced phrase in the middle Love – ‘so reproduction
lineage relationships ‘They may have been repelled to separate – different take me with Alteration of
analysis
Eat Me Gender ‘When I hit thirty, he brought me a cake’ – Final stanza Apathetic – ‘I 10 stanzas of
Imperative – Abuse subverts relatable diction, forthright, caesura sets all three lines didn’t taste 3 lines each
controlling, Relationships up conflict between ‘I’ and ‘he’ end stopped it’ Isometric –
predatory Control ‘Didn’t even taste it’ – absence of pleasure, short – reassertion Mournful – three lines of
Monosyllables Power sentence, emphasises the complete control of her
of control ‘my only equal length
impact dynamics senses
Alice in Insecurity ‘The bigger the better, he’d say…’ – use of
All but stanza pleasure’ – each
Wonderland – Greed comparative adjectives – greed – tricolon and 6 are end- Insecure/ containing
manipulation of Objectificatio repetitive ‘girls’ – objectification, demonstratives stopped angry – ‘too same (ish)
senses n and plurals – more than one victim 3 fat’ number of
Aging/time ‘Or a beached whale on a king-size bed / craving a Chronological Defiant – syllables
Desire/sex wave’ – language of fatphobia within society, – follows ‘how could I
gendered sexuality ‘king-size’, liquid imagery trajectory of not’
throughout poem – perpetual thirst/absence of narrative
freedom Direct
‘Too fat…’ – anaphora, insecurity/societal quotations –
perception, rising frustration/anger
tone shift
‘He said, Open wide, poured olive oil down my
throat’ – sexuality subverted, tactility –
discomfort, olive oil as a the most essential
symbol of what is unhealthy, child-like phrasing -
imperative
‘There was nothing else left in the house to eat’ –
ominous final line, disturbing, forces the reader to
question the ethics, finishes with eat – surrounded
by need for food, disturbing but appropriate
revenge
Chainsaw vs Nature ‘It seemed an unlikely match. All winter end stop at Helplessness Free verse
Pampas Human unplugged,…’ – opening line, caesura sets up the end of – ‘I looked on 8 stanzas –
Conflict set up violence conflict, short sentence impactful, each stanza – from the differing
as integral to Gender antagonistic, sets up masculine sexual an attempt upstairs lengths –
the poem – Discriminati aggression to assert window like Warrior???
particularly on ‘I trailed the day-glo orange power line…’ long human the midday Heroic?
between nature Passage of run on sentence – tedium and anticlimax, control moon’ Cyclical
and man-made time colour symbolism – human obtrusiveness and framed by Tedium – Heterometric
Mundanity warning – insertion of ‘I’ time ‘then cut and
Conflict ‘The chainsaw with its bloody desire, its sweet descriptive of , raked, cut
, Desire tooth’ – personification, dissociation from the a singular and raked’
speaker, danger of manmade – battle event Methodical –
between man and technology and nature use of long ‘from there’
‘The pampas grass with its ludicrous feathers’ sentences ‘then’
– symbolic femininity, syntactically parallels describing Aggression –
the chainsaw, antithetical symbols, ‘ludicrous’ tedious ‘It seemed an
insulting/mocking methodology unlikely
‘overkill’ – caesura completely undermines – slows the match’
the violence pace of the Frustrated –
‘Like cutting at water or air with a knife’ – use poem ‘to try and
of simile exposes human’s inconsequentiality emphasises forget’
on nature, foolishness of action, again the Sadistic –
establishes feminine vs masculine anticlimax ‘bloody
‘By June / it was riding high in its saddle, desire’
wearing a new crown. / Corn in Egypt’ – Tongue in
victory for nature, passage of time cheek/ironic –
emphasises the ephemerality of humanity ‘overkill’
against nature, biblical reference – Mock heroism
justified/holy about nature, entirely superior – ‘I let it flare,
to man lifted it into
‘The seamless urge to persist was as far as it the sun’
got.’ Cyclical, violence begets violence, ‘man-
made dreams’ – cynical hypallage,
emphasises the speaker/humanity’s
culpability – ‘urge’ – sexuality
The Gun – Violence ‘Bringing a gun into a house / changes it.’ – Enjambment Accusatory – Free verse
monosyllabic, Gender ambiguous ‘it’, foreshadowing, simple verbs – inevitable ‘your hands Imposition of
laconic, ‘the’ – Death ‘gun’ and ‘house’ juxtaposition of violence progression reek of gun short stanzas
pivotal, cold Nature and domesticity of violence – oil and – ‘a gun
and obtrusive, Humanity ‘You lay it on the kitchen table / stretched out adds impact entrails’ brings a
introduction of Love like something dead’ – direct address ‘you’ – = ‘shot’ – Disengaged/ house alive’ –
violence – Sex accusatory – separation from personal guilt – end-focussed narrative = bullet/impact
Chekov’s gun Beauty? provides a sense of conflict between speaker powerful ‘at first it’s ful and
(it must go off) and the gun-owner – personification words – just practice disruptive
– builds tension ‘stretched out’ – merging of life and death, impact to Active – End-stopped
lazy? poem? ‘excited’ – control
‘The long metal barrel / casting a grey shadow Mostly active Four stanzas?
, / on the green-checkered cloth’ – phallic complex participles
imagery – gendered conflict – colour sentences Sadistic –
symbolism – man’s effect on nature/the home contrasted ‘entrails’
– ‘shadow’ ominous with short
‘Then a rabbit shot / clean through the head’- sentences
monosyllabic ‘clean through…’ – ironic Repetition of
sanitisation of violence, volta – violence is idea of gun
realised, end of building suspense/tension – and house –
rabbit as symbolic of spring and joy central
‘there’s a spring / in your step; your eyes division/confli
gleam / like when sex was fresh / A gun brings ct
the house alive’ – semantic field of Increasingly
spring/life/hope – ‘spring’ ‘gleam’ ‘fresh’ macabre -
‘alive’ – awakening, ironic life provided by unrealistic
death/violence – past tense ‘was fresh’ –
difficulties/mundanity in relation – conflation
of sex and violence
‘I join in the cooking: jointing / and slicing,
stirring and tasting’ – insertion of ‘I’ –
personal complicity – exaggerated by the
excessive active participles – community
provided by violence
‘The King of Death…out of the winter woods /
his black mouth / sprouting golden crocuses’ –
mythological – awe and beauty, common
story of history – ‘king’ exaggerates gendered
divisions/hierarchy – alliterative ‘winter
woods’ – conflation of life and death – colour
symbolism ‘black’ and ‘golden’ – beauty from
death
Genetics – Love ‘My father’s in my fingers, but my mother’s in Rhyme and Sentimental – Villanelle –
scientific Inheritance my palms’ – excessive repetition of half rhyme – ‘but in me mirroring –
terminology, Family possessive pronoun ‘my’ – personal identity – pairs and they touch inheritance
idea of Religion consonance – impact – unity? – repeated unity – one where fingers Tercets until
inheritance, Sex motif of hands – tactility, intimacy, personal – mismatched link to palms’ last stanza –
continuation of Parental balanced phrase in the middle Love – ‘so reproduction
lineage relationships ‘They may have been repelled to separate – different take me with Alteration of
