_Before_the_Rain_,__Clouds__and__Mist_Upon_the_Placid_Morn__Comparison

“Before the Rain” by Thomas Bailey Aldrich is a short poem describing the scenery of nature just before it is about to rain. It contains simple but delightful imagery as opposed to “Clouds” by Rupert Brooke, who uses much deeper and more detailed imagery to describe the various roles that clouds play in nature. The third poem “Mist Upon the Placid Morn” by Mark R Slaughter, uses detailed and somewhat graphic imagery to describe the role of autumn in preparing the world for winter. Thomas Bailey Aldrich (1836-1907) was an American poet, Novelist and playwrite. In his poem before the rain he is using an almost conversational style to express that feeling one gets when it’s about to rain. It talks of the subtle hints nature throws out to indicate to us that it is going to rain. It has a mild suggestion of nature having a sort of hypothetical intelligence, whereby it knows when it is going to rain. The poet is also getting across that nature is a beautiful sight shortly before it rains. The poet keeps a relaxing, gentle tone until he intensifies the poem intensifies, becoming more aggressive, with the mention of lightning. There is not particular rhyme scheme the poem, despite various rhymes being found throughout the poem. He makes use of external rhyme in lines two and four of the first stanza and lines one and three and five and seven in the second stanza. He also makes use of imperfect rhyme with words like “morn and down”. He uses visual imagery, particularly when he talks about the “The spirit…lowering it’s golden buckets down…scooping the dew that lay in the flowers, dipping the jewels out of the sea, to sprinkle them over the land in showers”. He also uses personification here, giving the spirit human like capabilities. He further personifies nature when he says ‘the poplars showed the white of their leaves, the amber grain shrunk in the wind’ as if they knew what was coming and we taking defensive protective action. He finishes with the more powerful imagery of the lightning being ‘tangled in tremulous skeins of rain!’ Rupert Brooke (1887-1915) an English poet who was principally known for his war poetry. The poem ‘Clouds’ is a deviation from that topic, as it deals with nature although there is a definite military overtone to the entire poem, such as describing the clouds as ‘comradeless’. His aim in this poem is to describe clouds in their various functions, roles and endeavors. The poem has a somber atmosphere, conveyed by the poet’s dark and heavy tone. With the use of personification and Aural Imagery he likens the clouds to a regiment of soliders in the opening lines “Down the unending columns press, In noiseless tumult, break and wave and flow”. He makes use of various external rhyme patterns, but it becomes irregular in the last stanza. He continues the idea of the clouds as soldiers in lines such as ‘now tread the far south’ and ‘Some pause in their grave wandering comradeless’. The melancholy tone particularly stands out in the last stanza where he says ‘they say that the Dead die not, but remain near to the rich heirs of their grief and mirth’. Overall he conveys the clouds as looking down on the earth, watching the sea, the moon and the men that come and go. Mark R Slaughter (1957-) is an contemporary English poet who started his career as a biological scientist but took up poetry to enhance his writing skills. In the poem “Mist Upon the Placid Mourn” his biological science background shows in his wording. For example ‘Bleed out your beauty, Autumn’ and ‘smear your bloody hues…’. The poem describes the transition from Autumn to Winter. The poem describes how Autumn prepares us for winter and describes its role in a different and unexpected way. He personifies Autumn throughout the poem and speaks to it as if it’s a person in the first two stanzas and in the first line of the last stanza. For example, “Cast a calming throw of heady peace upon the cooling land” and “Autumn Lady, must you be the summer waning”. He uses his biological knowledge when he describes the autumn leaves rotting, “now lolling on a foliar deathbed with earthen whiff to intimate the fungal push”.