Blackberry Picking Essay

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‘BLACKBERRY-PICKING’, by Seamus Heaney, portrays of people’s in ability to enjoy something until it is gone and that it only becomes important to them when they can’t have it. It also portrays that things do not last forever. The fact that the poet tributes this this to poem ‘PHILIP HOBSBAUM’ and “we” and “our” is mentioned in the poem , implies to the reader that he is dead and was most likely his blackberry picking companion. The fact that it is summer in “Late August”, it gives the reader the idea that this is in the northern hemisphere. It can be said that the poet is writing as an adult and then implies that the poet is nostalgically looking back on fond memories of his childhood and his experiences of blackberry picking. The poem is divided into two parts, the first longer, describing the picking of the blackberries and the process of the consumption. The second part addresses the storage and ruin of the remainder. “You ate the first one and its flesh was sweet/Like thickened wine: summer’s blood was in it”. This represents the eagerness in picking blackberries and the joy that he got from doing so, and “Leaving stains upon the tongue and lust for picking”. This shows the desire or the human grieve for the blackberries and conveys some emotion in this instance. Heaney describes what the blackberries look like in depth, “With green ones, and on top big dark blobs burned”. The use of alliteration here adds emphasis to the line and enriches the description of the blackberries, giving the reader a clear image of what it looked like. Although it states the “Our hands were peppered with thorn pricks”, they continued to pick the blackberries and “peppered” shows that they are willing to suffer in order to satisfy “that Hunger”. “Our palms sticky as Bluebeard’s”, their palms are stained with the black berry juice, as "Bluebeard's" were stained with blood. We see that

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