Stanza 1:
- 'grey tangled streets' is a metaphor for life and it's unpredicatabliity, as well as introducing a negative tone.
- 'first cigerette''first botched love affair' shows the amount of memories this place holds, and the way it was a place of beginnings for him, asserted as he says 'first everything' demonstrating how this place held a lot of meaning for him. 'Botched' connotes youth and the mistakes he made.
- 'faded torments' may suggest he was bullied, with 'faded' connoting scars he may have from his life there, as well as showing he has aged.
Stanza 2:
- 'a raid on mislaid identities' suggests it is uncomfortable to him bringing up the past and who he used to be. It may also suggest that when he was younger he had irrealistic views of what life would be like, and his self now shows how wrong he was.
- 'the whole locus smaller' may link to how a child sees everything as bigger and better than it is, and now he sees it as it is, which is what he suggests maturity brings.
- 'Taff now a stream' reinforces this and suggests maybe Abse has grown out of this town. Time changing your view on things and becoming much bleaker is presented in 'Home is so Sad'.
- a 'gothic dream' becoming a 'joker's facade' contrasts a childs view to an adults perspective, looking up at something and then looking down. This links to 'Reading Habits'.
Stanza 3:
- 'unfocused voices in the wind' suggests he can't quite recognise the voices of the place anymore, things are more of a blur to him now, linking to the way memories blur over time.
- 'associations, clues' suggests things are triggering memories but he can't quite grasp them and also suggests it is almost a game to him, possibly because he is being reminded of his childhood.
- 'white, enormous face' of his dead grandfather reinforces a childs perspective.
- 'aghast with certain news' links to the idea of the knowledge of death in Days.
Stanza 4:
- unable to define anything i can hardly speak' suggests that without knowledge you have nothing, linking to nothing to be said.
- 'still i love the place for what i wanted it to be' shows he still has affection for his memories but they are no longer connected with this city, showing the dissapointment of reality.
- 'what it unashamably is' shows there is no questioning it is just a 'city of strangers' to him now.
Stanza 5:
- 'betrayed' shows his hurt at not recognising this city.
- 'sense reflections' gives the idea of an illusion.
- 'anchored waterscapes that wander' is a paradox showing how things change and you can't control them, and links to cardiff as it is the same city but completely different.
- 'as light slants down a different shade' shows time changing 'hour by hour'.
Stanza 6:
- 'illusory' suggests memories are misleading.
- 'lost' suggests the place is gone for him now, he feels he has lost a part of him.
- 'dark' suggests memories have shaded over time.
- 'once called' shows things have changed.
- 'only real this smell of ripe damp earth' suggests the only thing that stay is nature, real elements contrast with childhood memories 'half exquisite and half plain' which may connote the contrast in his imaginative child hood and boring adult life.
Stanza 7:
- 'the other cardiff had gone' suggests they can't coexist, and reality takes over memories.
- 'smoke' hides reality like the memories and could mean fire was the old cardiff, but the new cardiff and the adult him are just smoke.
- 'tinned ressemblances' suggests they are preserved memories and crammed together.
- 'the boy i was not and the man i am not' suggests his child hood and adult life are seperate. It suggests his memories were illusions, as were his childhood dreams for himself and he sees himself as a disapointment. End the poem with a depressing tone.
Links:
- your home changing -'Home is so Sad'
- meaning changing over time- 'An arundal tomb''LOve songs in age'
- child perspective v adult 'a study of reading habits'
- disapointment in your age 'sned no money'
- a place allowing you to see who you are 'the importance of elsewhere'
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