Analysis Of Seamus Heaney's Mid-Term Break

All students are excited for breaks from school, but in Seamus Heaney’s case his break was more of a hard blow than a relaxing time. This lyrical poem addresses the reader directly by reaching their emotions. The poem is about an elder brother who was away at school but had to return home in order to attend the funeral of his younger brother who tragically passed away. The poem is written in first person from the viewpoint of Seamus Heaney himself, he focuses on the reactions of his parents and the people he see’s instead of his own. Seamus Heaney 's “Mid-Term Break” uses sound, motifs, and enjambment to create meaning throughout the poem.
Sound such as sibilance, the hard “c” sound, and alliteration, to create meaning as they all serve …show more content…
Geography creates Heaney’s anguish indirectly. When he first got home “In the porch [he] met [his] father crying”. Even though it was not his own anguish, one can make an inference that by seeing his father cry Heaney must have shared the same anguish as him. Time, like geography creates a feeling of hopelessness, because no matter how much time goes by, there is no feeling of relief, in fact the it becomes worse. Beginning in the “morning” to “two o’clock”, and even the “next morning” the emotions in the poem go from gloomy to comfortless because nothing can ever comfort someone who has suffered from a loss like Heanley. Unlike sounds and motifs, enjambment portrays Henley 's emotions the …show more content…
The enjambment only occurs when someone is touching him, which allows the reader to understand the trouble he is having not showing any emotion. When the “old men [stood] up to shake [his] hand/ And [telling him] there were ‘sorry for [his] trouble”, it demonstrated how Heaney was almost panicked due to the overwhelming scene he was in. In addition, the location of the enjambement is only where someone is touching him. Such as when “his mother held [his] hand it was almost like, by seeing everyone else in their state of mourning it made it that much harder to hide his actual feelings, but in reality it reveals that he in fact does have much emotion. Enjambment is important to establishing the meaning of the poem because it displays a bit of Heaney’s attitude towards the death of his brother.
Through the use of enjambment, motifs, and sounds, Seamus Heaney establishes a specific meaning to his poem, “Mid-Term Break”. The meaning of the poem is to show how Heaney dealt with the loss of his own brother, even at such a young age. Language is powerful and helps the reader understand the meaning of the poem because the language used reflects the author 's/narrator 's emotions that he was feeling from his personal experiences of the event. Breaks from school are not always happy or relaxing, and within