Speaker or Narrator, and Point of View
In the first two stanzas of the poem, the speaker is a choral “we” of the three Magi recalling the journey to Bethlehem they undertook to witness the birth of Jesus. In the final stanza the voice shifts to the singular “I” of a Magus who evaluates the journey long after it has passed.
Form and Meter
Free verse
Metaphors and Similes
Simile:
“this Birth was/
Hard and bitter agony for us, like Death, our death.”
Alliteration and Assonance
Alliteration:
“cold coming”
“The summer palaces on slopes, the terraces,/And the silken girls bringing sherbet.”
“camel men cursing”
“Sleeping in snatches”
“at dawn we came down”
“dicing for pieces of silver”
“it was (you may say) satisfactory”
Assonance:
“And the camels galled, sore-footed, refractory,
Lying down in the melting snow.”
“running away, and wanting their liquor and women,”
Irony
Dramatic irony: “this Birth was/Hard and bitter agony for us, like Death, our death."
The Magus expected that he had traveled all that way to experience the joy of a birth. It turns out that although it was a birth, it was not joyous, but agonizing, because it was the opposite of birth: death, both of Jesus himself and of the pagan way of life. As readers in the Christian era, we know the story of Jesus' crucifixation, as well as the decline of paganism and the advent of Christianity. This creates a tension between what we know and what the Magus has to find out, leading to dramatic irony.
Situational irony: “Finding the place; it was (you may say) satisfactory.”
The reader expects the magus to be in awe at this moment, the climax of the story: the birth of Jesus. Instead, he uses the word "satisfactory," which has a very flat affect, and qualifies it with the parenthetical "(you may say)" which distances himself from even mild positivity.
Genre
Christmas poem; religious poetry
Setting
Persia, Judea, and the the desert between
Tone
Suffering
Protagonist and Antagonist
Protagonist: The Magi Antagonist: Jesus Christ?
Major Conflict
The old dispensation (Pagan world of magic and sensuality) vs. the new dispensation (Christianity)
Climax
Christ’s birth, which is only alluded to.
Foreshadowing
“three trees low on the sky”
Understatement
“not a moment too soon/
Finding the place; it was (you may say) satisfactory.”
Allusions
The running stream and water-mill are a Biblical allusion: in John 4:10-14, Jesus called himself the Living Water. The stream powers a mill “beating the darkness,” alluding to Jesus’ claim in John 8:12 to be the Light of the World. The “three trees low on the sky” have been interpreted variously by scholars to refer to the crucifixion of Christ with the two thieves on crosses to either side of him, or the Trinity of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. The “white horse” refers to the one in Zechariah 6:5, who announces the coming of Jesus.
The Magi arrive at a tavern with “vine-leaves over the lintel,” a Biblical allusion to both the story of Passover from Exodus 12 and the notion of Christ as the “True Vine” (John 15:1, 5). The word “lintel” is rooted in the Latin word limen, which means threshold. They are on the threshold before both the entry to Bethlehem, and the moment before Christ is born, which for the Christian faithful will change the world entirely. The hands and feet in the next two lines are biblical allusions to the bartering for Christ (Matthew 26:14-16) and Jesus’ parable of the new wine (Matthew 9:17).
Metonymy and Synecdoche
Synecdoche: “Six hands...and feet”
Personification
The cities, towns, and villages
These are personified to represent the hostility of the townspeople the Magi meet on their journey.
