Speaker or Narrator, and Point of View
first person speaker
Form and Meter
free verse, with the occasional internal or slant rhyme
Metaphors and Similes
Alliteration and Assonance
"it is 1959 and I go get a shoeshine"
Repetition of a long /i/ sound
"I walk up the muggy street beginning to sun"
Repeition of /u/
"casually ask for a carton of Gauloises and a carton/ of Picayunes"
Repetition of /c/, /a/, and /o/
"... she whispered a song along the keyboard"
Repetition of /u/
Irony
The poem's irony lies in genre: "The Day Lady Died" is an elegy that does not reveal itself as such until the end.
Genre
elegy, postmodern poetry
Setting
the streets of New York City
Tone
busy, reflective
Protagonist and Antagonist
Major Conflict
The major conflict of "The Day Lady Dies" manifests in the everyday demands of New York City life, like walking through muggy streets, going to the bank, and preparing for dinner with a group of people the speaker doesn't know well. It also appears in the unpredictability of this kind of life, when news about events that occur on the other side of the country become instantly available. Word of Holiday's death interrupts the speaker's routine, launching him into a memory whose tone contrasts strongly with the surrounding bustle.
Climax
The climax of this poem occurs in line 27, when the speaker recognizes Billie Holiday's face on a newspaper and reads a headline that announces her death. The shock breaks the speaker's morning reverie and routine, launching back to a memory years before, when he attended one of Holiday's shows.
Foreshadowing
The speaker's description of the day the poem takes place—"three days after Bastille day, yes"—could hint at the forthcoming shock of Holiday's death, the violent toll of drugs and alcohol upon her body.
Understatement
Allusions
The speaker references several artists and writers in the third stanza, whose work ranges from French Symbolist to Classical Greek poetry. This gives us a sense of the speaker's character, and the character of Pasty, for whom the speaker purchased "the little Verlaine."
Metonymy and Synecdoche
"a little Verlaine," which corresponds to a book of poems by Verlaine
Personification
Hyperbole
"after practically going to sleep with quandariness"
When the speaker chooses a book for Patsy in the Golden Griffin, he exaggerates the tediousness of the action.
"...she whispered a song along the keyboard/ to Mal Waldron and everyone and I stopped breathing"
The speaker says that everyone who witnessed Holiday's show "stopped breathing" to emphasize the power of her performance as he describes its effect on the audience.
