To me, the song seems to be told from the point of view of a sailor and also his wife/significant other that waits for him. Most of the song seems to be told from the point of view of the wife, up until the lyrics “in the trough of the waves which are pawing like dogs.” As I see it, the sailor left on a voyage and never returned. Throughout life we all have moments like the sailor's wife where we contemplate eternity and a possible afterlife.
The song starts out with someone seemingly philosophizing about eternity- I believe this is the wife, she asks if her lover will wait for her at the door to eternity so to speak. There is no mention of setting for most of the work, this adds a dream-like quality to the piece. The bell symbolizes the memory of the loved ones that left us, thus when the bell is dropped from the “top of the wide, white stairs” it falls forever and echoes not just throughout our remaining days, but forever as it passes from generation to generation.
After the death of a loved one we're left with memories, and like a bell falling down a staircase they never fade from our lives completely. But if someone leaves on a ship and is lost in a storm many times they are never seen or heard from again, this was especially true a hundred years ago or more. Their family and friends would be left wondering whether their loved one's ship crashed in a foreign land and they didn't have a way back, if they are slowly dying on a deserted island, or if they died before anyone even realized that something went wrong. The memory of the sailor is muted by the waves, by the possibility that they aren't gone forever. Not to say that the memory of them is forgotten, because it would still be there despite the lack of closure, but the most powerful feeling associated with the sailor would be the hope that they're still alive somewhere out there.
The sailor's wife was so deep in thought, and grief, at the start of the poem that she was in a listless, trance-like state as she fell asleep. “The moment I slept I was swept up in a terrible tremor, though no longer bereft, how I shook, and I couldn't remember.” From these lines I gather that she began to dream, and all of the lines up until “in the trough of the waves which are pawing like dogs” are taken from her dream. The dream itself is made up of fractionated memories that have been filled with new symbolic meaning. The point of view seems to shift to the sailor aboard his vessel with the line “In the trough of the waves which are pawing like dogs,” but this could have been the wife dreaming of the sailor's fate.
To me, the song seems to be told from the point of view of a sailor and also his wife/significant other that waits for him. Most of the song seems to be told from the point of view of the wife, up until the lyrics “in the trough of the waves which are pawing like dogs.” As I see it, the sailor left on a voyage and never returned. Throughout life we all have moments like the sailor's wife where we contemplate eternity and a possible afterlife.
The song starts out with someone seemingly philosophizing about eternity- I believe this is the wife, she asks if her lover will wait for her at the door to eternity so to speak. There is no mention of setting for most of the work, this adds a dream-like quality to the piece. The bell symbolizes the memory of the loved ones that left us, thus when the bell is dropped from the “top of the wide, white stairs” it falls forever and echoes not just throughout our remaining days, but forever as it passes from generation to generation.
After the death of a loved one we're left with memories, and like a bell falling down a staircase they never fade from our lives completely. But if someone leaves on a ship and is lost in a storm many times they are never seen or heard from again, this was especially true a hundred years ago or more. Their family and friends would be left wondering whether their loved one's ship crashed in a foreign land and they didn't have a way back, if they are slowly dying on a deserted island, or if they died before anyone even realized that something went wrong. The memory of the sailor is muted by the waves, by the possibility that they aren't gone forever. Not to say that the memory of them is forgotten, because it would still be there despite the lack of closure, but the most powerful feeling associated with the sailor would be the hope that they're still alive somewhere out there.
The sailor's wife was so deep in thought, and grief, at the start of the poem that she was in a listless, trance-like state as she fell asleep. “The moment I slept I was swept up in a terrible tremor, though no longer bereft, how I shook, and I couldn't remember.” From these lines I gather that she began to dream, and all of the lines up until “in the trough of the waves which are pawing like dogs” are taken from her dream. The dream itself is made up of fractionated memories that have been filled with new symbolic meaning. The point of view seems to shift to the sailor aboard his vessel with the line “In the trough of the waves which are pawing like dogs,” but this could have been the wife dreaming of the sailor's fate.