Soap Suds Analysis

This brand of soap has the same smell as once in the big
House he visited when he was eight: the walls of the bathroom open
To reveal a lawn where a great yellow ball rolls back through a hoop
To rest at the head of a mallet held in the hands of a child.

And these were the joys of that house: a tower with a telescope;
Two great faded globes, one of the earth, one of the stars;
A stuffed black dog in the hall; a walled garden with bees;
A rabbit warren; a rockery; a vine under glass; the sea.

To which he has now returned. The day of course is fine
And a grown-up voice cries Play! The mallet slowly swings,
Then crack, a great gong booms from the dog-dark hall and the ball
Skims forward through the hoop and then through the next and then

Through hoops where no hoops were and each dissolves in turn
And the grass has grown head-high and an angry voice cries Play!
But the ball is lost and the mallet slipped long since from the hands
Under the running tap that are not the hands of a child.

.: :.

I believe that this poem is one about MacNeice looking back on a time when he visited a house. While he was at the house, it was the best time of his life. He felt he could really be a kid here. When he goes back as an adult, he wants nothing else but to be a kid again and get to go out and play. But he cant. He has to act like an adult and that kills him inside because he wants nothing more than to go out and play.

| Posted on 2007-03-28 | by a guest