Speaker or Narrator, and Point of View
The speaker uses a first-person perspective and is likely representative of Williams himself. He appears to be addressing his wife. He expresses remorse about eating the plums but also describes their enjoyable taste in detail.
Form and Meter
The poem is written in free verse. It has no meter or rhyme scheme. It is made up of three quatrains.
Metaphors and Similes
N/A
Alliteration and Assonance
Alliteration is present in the S sounds of the line "so sweet."
Irony
N/A
Genre
Imagist poetry
Setting
The poem is set in a kitchen.
Tone
The poem's tone is straightforward and regretful.
Protagonist and Antagonist
The protagonist is the speaker.
Major Conflict
The main conflict of the poem is the speaker feeling guilty about eating someone else's plums, having enjoyed them very much.
Climax
The climax of the poem occurs when the speaker asks to be forgiven and remembers the taste of the plums.
Foreshadowing
The speaker saying he has eaten the plums in the first stanza foreshadows his later apology for having done so.
Understatement
N/A
Allusions
N/A
Metonymy and Synecdoche
N/A
Personification
N/A
Hyperbole
The speaker frames the eating of the plums as the committing of a crime or significant moral infraction.
Onomatopoeia
N/A
