“Every morning I take the cow to the pasture we rent from M r. Chisolm. She, Nelly, could probably go by herself just as well, but I like marching through the village with a big stick, directing her.”
The narrator’s penchant for walking the cow to the pasture surmises that she enjoys the pastoral life. Furthermore, taking the cow to the pasture guarantees that she will eat to its fill for the entire duration it will be there, for there are no restrictions on the amount of grass it can consume.
“I hate seeing animals in cages, especially small cages, and especially circus animals, but I think that Marianne, while probably feeling the same way, was so passionately interested in them, and knew so much about them, that she could put aside any pain or outrage for the time being. That day I remember that one handsomely patterned snake, writhing about in a glasswalled cage, seemed to raise his head on purpose to look at us.”
Naturally, animals are meant to be in the wild where they can roam freely without constraint. Cages are emblematic of the animals’ inhibited freedom. While in the cages, the animals appeal to viewers; however, their lives are interrupted because they cannot be in their natural habitats. Bishop dislikes the caging due to empathy which makes her to reckon how he would feel if her life and movement were to be curbed by cage-like restrictions.
“She said her poem “Spenser’s Ireland” was not about loving Ireland, as people seemed to think, but about disapproving of it. Yet she liked being of Irish descent; her great-great-grandfather had run away from a house in Merrion Square, Dublin (once, I went to look at it from the outside), and I remember her delight when the book in which the poem appeared was bound in Irish green.”
Readers' interpretation of Moore's poem is incorrect. The message in the poem is misinterpreted due to the literal interpretation which does not focus on the diction which invalidates it. Furthermore, Moore's resolution to undermine a country that shaped her descent indicates her objectivity as a writer. She does not let her descent hinder her from writing an unbiased poem.
