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Poetry Analysis: One Art by Elizabeth Bishop

One art by Elizabeth Bishop is a classic poem with the villanelle format; a five stanza

poem with three lines in each stanza and a final quatrain. Elizabeth uses a regular rhyme scheme

which follows the order ABA. The main theme of the poem is loss; she contemplates about the

art of losing by constructing a list of several common losses including, door keys, houses a

watch, land and finally climaxing at the loss of a loved one. The poem begins with a casual tone

about loss recording the events of loss ironically as a non-disastrous occurrence, but later

culminates in a serious tone with the event of losing a loved one, acknowledging that indeed loss

may be a disaster.

Elizabeth’s poem is contradictory, mixing in the idea that loss is mutable and later

acknowledging that loss is immutable. Elizabeth’s initial catalogue of losses such as the door

keys and names are an expression of regular losses that are hardly felt as disastrous. This is a

creative venture attempting to forget the more important things an individual has lost by equating

them to other little losses in life. Despite losing some essential things in her life such as her

mother’s watch, she puts up a brave face and insisting that the “the art of losing isn’t hard to

master.” (Bishop, 4-3). It indicates that the writer has mastered the art of living with loss to the

extent that it has become a normal occurrence. However, in the last line of the fifth stanza, she

contradicts the initial opinion about loss by admitting that indeed, it may be a disaster, “though it
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may look like (Write it!) Like disaster” (Bishop 5-4).This contradicting statement portrays some

losses as more vital than others and that the art of loss cannot be entirely mastered. While she

may have learnt the art of losing minor things in life, she realizes that the loss of a loved one is

the greatest disaster of mortality.

Elizabeth’s One Art is strengthened by a powerful use of different sound patterns that

emphasize on her main theme. As a villanelle poem, the poem has a regular rhyme scheme that

enhances its musical flow. The full end rhyme includes words such as, “master”, “disaster,”

“fluster”, “master,” “faster,” “faster,” “vaster” and “gesture.” They collectively form a regular

rhyme flow with the consistent scheme of ABA, ABA. The flow of the poem is further perfected

by alliteration, a repetition of consonant sounds on the same line. In the third stanza Elizabeth

alliterates the /l/ and /f/ sounds in “losing farther, losing faster.” /l/ sound is further repeated in

the last line of the poem, “it may look like… like disaster.” Her main theme, of loss is highly

influenced by the ironic tone of the poet. The last stanza of the poem end are highly ironic as she

claims that even losing “you” the loved one is not hard not master. But at the end she

acknowledges that is a disaster. The ironic tone shows a contradiction between the art of

mastering loss which she has emphasized from the beginning of the poem and the impossibility

of mastering the loss of a loved one.

The theme of loss in Elizabeth’s One Art, is almost similar to the portrayal of death in

Eveline’s “Many forms of death.” Like, Elizabeth, Eveline takes of the drama and too much

emotions from the issue of death. Referring to her mother’s death, she says life was better before

her death, but does not necessarily put in too much emotions in grieving. Similarly she lists a

catalogue of losses that are metaphoric of death which include the death of people in her life and

other sad events in her life. Eveline equates the issue of death to the loss of people or separation
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by thinking that leaving to Dublin was like ending her life to those she left behind, this is similar

to Elizabeth view of death as losing important things in life.

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Works cited

Bishop, Elizabeth. One Art. The complete poems 1926-1979

Eveline, The many forms of death, 1914