Loveliest of trees poem meaning

A. E. HOUSMAN (1859-1936)

A Shropshire Lad 2: Loveliest of trees, the cherry now (1896)

Loveliest of trees, the cherry now

Is hung with bloom along the bough,

And stands about the woodland ride

Wearing white for Eastertide.

Now, of my threescore years and ten,

Twenty will not come again,

And take from seventy springs a score,

It only leaves me fifty more.

And since to look at things in bloom

Fifty springs are little room,

About the woodlands I will go

To see the cherry hung with snow.

1. The poem is about counting. What does the speaker count?

2. We can count syllables, meter, and lines. Are stanzas ways of counting?

3. Notice the language used in counting. What does “threescore” mean?

4. Why does the speaker not simply say “sixty”?

5. Do we understand better when we come to “seventy springs”?

6. Where does the phrase “threescore years and ten” come from?

7. The speaker refers to “my threescore years and ten.” In what sense are they his?

8. “[F]ifty more” what? Why refer to “only” fifty more? Why is 50 “little room”?

9. What is the difference between fifty years and fifty springs?

10. What is the difference between “Eastertide” and spring?

11. What is the metaphor implied in saying that the cherry tree wears white for Eastertide?

12. What is the difference between “hung with bloom” (2) and “hung with snow” (12)?

13. How do we understand “snow”? Is it a description of trees in winter covered with snow? Or is “snow” a metaphor for white blossoms at Easter?

14. How do the different answers possible in 11 change the meaning of the poem?

15. What is the importance of seeing cherry trees? What differences are there between this poem and another poem on the loveliness of nature, Hopkins’ “Pied Beauty”?

A. Read the poem several times. Think over the questions

B. Write a 4-page essay on Housman’s sense of loveliness in this poem.

C. Do not write the paper as if answering questions 1-15.

D. Choose your own idea about the poem and develop that idea in your discussion.

PAPER DUE: November 01