| What does the cardboard depicts in the poem ? | Cardboard’ in the poem refers to the photograph. This word has been used because photograph is now just a piece of paper with the memory as the poets mother is dead now. It shows that human life is transitory and the cardboard which remains is memorable piece of paper. |
| What is the meaning of the line "Both wry with the laboured ease of loss" | Both the author and her mother had fond memories which brought pain with them. The mother laughed when she looked at the photograph of the beach holiday with her cousins but felt a pang of pain remembering that her childhood was gone, and those days could not come back again.
For the author, the memory of her mother's laughter when she was presented with the photograph came back again around twelve years after her mother died. She nursed the pain that the loss brought with it but was happy to remember the day she laughed so fondly. |
| What was the name of two girls | Dolly & Betty |
| Name of poet ? | Name of poet ? |
| What has not changed over the years? Does this suggest something to you? | The sea has changed less but not in an observable way. Yes, this suggests that human life is transient. The transparency of the human life is compared with the permanent nature of sea. |
| How Old was the big girl ? | The big Girl was 12 years old ? |
| What is the meaning of terribly transient feet ? | This means that the feet are transient and keep changing, unlike the sea which remains the same |
| What has the camera captured ? | The camera showed how it was when the two girl cousins went paddling, each one holding their mothers hands, all three stood still to smile through their hairs at the camera |
| The poets mother laughed at the snapshot. what did this laugh indicate ? | The laugh indicated that the sea holiday was the past of the poet's mother, and her laugh was the past of the poet |
| This circumstance refers to the death of the poets mother. | This circumstance refers to the death of the poets mother. |
| The three stanzas depict three different phases. what are they ? | the first stanza is nostalgic which shows that the poet was remembering about the photograph where the two girl cousins had went paddling
the second stanza is where the poet remembers about what her mother used to say after laughing at the snapshot.
the third stanza depicts sadness, where the poet is sad when she talks abou her mothers death and of circumstance where there is nothing to say at all. |
