The Field Mouse

Structure
• Three stanzas of 9 lines
• Lines- varying lengths- reflect lack of order in the war- torn world

Language/ Themes
• Present tense
- Makes events seem more vivid and suggests that the poem could be true of any
war
• Guilt/ innocence
o“children kneel in long grass”
- This may suggests that many children were massacred in the Bosnian war, and they
were made to kneel and were shot
- Strong feeling of guilt/ innocence- the innocent children can only kneel in front of
adults, as adults kneel to God, and wonder what has happened
- The fact that they are kneeling on the long grass instead of the short (where
suffering of mouse occurred) suggests that they were kept isolated from the war
o“quivering mouse...we have crushed”
- This shows that even a peaceful activity such as ay making contains violence
- Emphasising that even if you think you are doing good (fighting in the war) you will
still unintentionally cause pain
• Implied parallels of hay making and war (mostly metaphors)
o“his hands a nest of quivering mouse”
- Reminds us of how a parent cradles a baby, their hands are a nest- the comfort of
home and how they will do anything to protect the baby because it is small and
vulnerable.
- This suggests that the war makes children grow up faster than they should and
comfort and protect others
o“killed flowers”
- Symbolism of the murdered people in Bosnia
o“the field’s hurt...the field lies bleeding”
- Field is metaphor for country- field(battlefield)- all of the people killed on the earth
and all the people bleeding hurts it
- May suggest that all this war and suffering hurts mother nature as well
o“The dusk garden inhabited by the saved, voles, frogs, a nest of mice”
- These are the animals that survived the tractor- makes us think of the human
refugees that escaped the Bosnian conflict
- “dusk” may be symbolism for the end
o“my neighbour turned stranger, wounding my land with stones”
- Neighbour who gave land sweetness in the first stanza is now an enemy, wounding
the land. In the Bosnian conflict, neighbours of different religions who had lived
peacefully together became enemies
• Military vocabulary
o“jets...sparks burning...gunfire”
- Reinforces parallels between making hay and war
• Paradox’s
o“summer, and the long grass...air hums with jets”
- Shows the contrast between the rural simplicity and complexities of life on a larger
scale- paradox emphasises that even in the happiest place there is still evil and bad
in the world
- And even the simplest and peaceful activities of cutting hay will affect life- see
above “the mouse...we have crushed”
o“cloud of lime”
- Lime drifting on to their soil to sweeten it
 - Lime seems peaceful but under the surface- it was used to break down bodies in the
concentration camps

Sound
• Assonance
o“summer...drum...hums”- sounds like insects
• Alliteration
o“bones brittle as mouse ribs”
- Emphasises how easy their bones are to break and how easy it is to kill them
- “I” sound sounds like the bones breaking

Imagery
• Metaphor
oE.g. “cloud of lime”
- Lime drifting on to their soil to sweeten it
- Lime seems peaceful but under the surface- it was used to break down bodies in the
concentration camps
o“agony big as itself”
- Clarke said that “the birth and death of animals are momentous, intimate events”-
it is reflected here- she shows that even though the death of a mouse to most is
trivial, it isn’t to the mouse