Im sorry poems8/23/2023 You want to say something to the grieving person that means a little more than this much-repeated phrase. And just what will you say? The same old thing? Or something a little different, with more meaning? Something that is a little more personal and authentic? Now he’s older and both his parents have died, Harrison regrets not appreciating the time he spent with them more – the final line is a heart-breaking twist on two familiar idioms, and poignantly conveys his sense of sorrow over not appreciating his time with his parents more.Sometimes this can be such an empty refrain.Īt some point in our lives, we will all have to offer our condolences to someone. One of many beautiful and moving sonnets Harrison wrote in the wake of his parents’ deaths, this poem sees Harrison reminiscing about a family holiday to Blackpool, where his father ordered his young son to stop playing arcade games and instead spend time walking along the promenade with his parents. But it was not his parents’ fault – so is he saying he’s sorry for the sad and helpless situation, that he accepts they were sorry for his life, or even that he is sorry for feeling the way he does towards them? The poem hovers somewhere between all three. Although physically he was strong and never went hungry, he felt psychologically stifled by his surroundings. Thomas (1913-2000) forgives his parents for his life, his upbringing in a ‘drab town’ in Wales, and the mental effects this had on him, inhibiting him. Such is the case with this feisty Millay poem, in which she objects to her partner thinking that the book she is reading is too clever for her (because she’s a woman, we assume). As well as poems which see poets saying how sorry they are and apologising profusely and sincerely for something (or less sincerely, as with Williams’s poem above), ‘sorry’ poems might also include those poems which warn others that they will end up being sorry for their actions. Vincent Millay, ‘ Oh, Oh, You Will Be Sorry’. The lines quoted above are not an excerpt from the longer poem, but represent the full thing – although if you follow the link provided you can learn more about Lawrence’s ‘sorry’ little poem.Įdna St. ![]() Lawrence himself described as a ‘pansy’: like the flower, this poem is a pensée, a little thought, not meant to be anything grander or more sustained. Without ever having felt sorry for itself. Lawrence ever wrote, but it’s worth sharing here (with a few brief words of analysis) because, unlike Sons and Lovers or a poem like ‘Snake’ (which is also about being sorry for something), it is not as well-known among his oeuvre.Ī small bird will drop frozen dead from a bough However, the mischievous note on which the poem ends, with the speaker admitting how tasty the plums were, seems to be rubbing the poor plumless person’s nose in it somewhat. Perhaps the most famous ‘I’m sorry’ note in the whole of Anglophone poetry (we say ‘Anglophone’ rather than ‘English’ because Williams’s poetry fits most squarely in the American tradition), this short piece of free verse sees the speaker apologising for eating the plums in the icebox which the note’s recipient was probably saving to enjoy later. William Carlos Williams, ‘ This Is Just to Say’. But there is more to the sorrow in Housman’s poetry than this. As the critic Sir Christopher Ricks once observed before questioning such a judgement, Housman’s own poetry might be reductively and somewhat cruelly summed up by the adolescent sentiment, ‘One day I’ll be dead, and then you’ll be sorry’. ![]() ![]() Memorably used as the epigraph for the final Colin Dexter novel featuring Inspector Morse, The Remorseful Day, this poem – or the final stanza – was quoted by John Thaw as Morse in the television adaptation of the novel.
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