Love After Love by Derek Walcott, Analysis & Summary
Table of Contents
This study guide provides a detailed analysis of the poem "Love After Love" by Derek Walcott. The guide explores the meaning and themes of each stanza, examines the poet's background, offers a critical analysis of the poem, discusses the use of symbols, language, structure, sound devices, and other literary devices. Additionally, it highlights the attitudes and feelings conveyed in the poem and suggests similar poems that share common themes.
Poem Text
The time will come
when, with elation
you will greet yourself arriving
at your own door, in your own mirror
and each will smile at the other's welcome,
and say, sit here. Eat.
You will love again the stranger who was your self.
Give wine. Give bread. Give back your heart
to itself, to the stranger who has loved you
all your life, whom you ignored
for another, who knows you by heart.
Take down the love letters from the bookshelf,
the photographs, the desperate notes,
peel your own image from the mirror.
Sit. Feas…