Speaker or Narrator, and Point of View
An unidentified, omniscient third-person speaker
Form and Meter
Sestina
Metaphors and Similes
This poem uses a great deal of figurative language. Metaphors include "The iron kettle sings," "the teakettle's small hard tears," "her teacup full of dark brown tears," while similes include "the way the rain must dance on the house," "Birdlike," and "buttons like tears."
Alliteration and Assonance
Alliteration appears in the phrases "sings on the stove," "time for tea," and "hovers half open." Assonance appears in the phrases "sits in the kitchen," "hovers above," and "puts more wood."
Irony
The poem employs dramatic irony in two directions. The reader knows that both the grandmother and grandchild are experiencing similar emotions, but neither character fully understands this, since they are unable or unwilling to speak openly with one another.
Genre
Lyric poem
Setting
A kitchen in a house on a September evening
Tone
Mournful, restrained, precise, sorrowful
Protagonist and Antagonist
The protagonists are the grandmother and grandchild, while the antagonist is an unnamed event or trauma disrupting their serenity
Major Conflict
The work's major conflict is each character's attempt to come to terms with or overcome an unnamed tragedy or trauma—as well as the characters' mutual negotiation as they try to navigate the aftermath of that trauma together.
Climax
The poem's climax occurs when the moons from the almanac fall and change form, watering the flowerbed in the child's drawing.
Foreshadowing
The poem does not itself contain foreshadowing. However, it does describe instances of foreshadowing or prediction within its own narrative, such as, "She thinks that her equinoctial tears / and the rain that beats on the roof of the house / were both foretold by the almanac."
Understatement
This poem as a whole is understated, referring to the sadness of the grandmother and grandchild only through the oblique symptom of tears—in other words, its understatement is tonal, infusing the work as a whole.
Allusions
The poem alludes to Marvel, a brand of kitchenware
Metonymy and Synecdoche
N/A
Personification
This work is packed with personification, including in phrases like "the teakettle's small hard tears/dance like mad," and "the clever almanac." Later, inanimate objects speak in an even more dramatic instance of this device: "It was to be, says the Marvel Stove. / I know what I know, says the almanac," and "Time to plant tears, says the almanac."
Hyperbole
The line "but only known to a grandmother" is mildly hyperbolic.
Onomatopoeia
N/A
