Farewell to Barn and Stack and Tree by A.E.

Houseman
A.E. Housman was a popular poet and was born in 1859 in
Worcestershire England. He began his life as a clerk in the patent office
for eleven years. Meanwhile Housman was making his name in the field
of textual criticism by being engaged in some serious study works and
research in the British museum. In 1896 he published A Shropshire Lad
a compilation of his poetry collection consisting of his sixty-three poems.
In 1911 he became the professor of Latin in Cambridge and a fellow of
Trinity College. In 1936 he passed away in a nursing home in his sleep.
In this poem A.E. Houseman uses traditional ballad style. A ballad is a
narrative poem which tells the story of some dramatic happenings
involving violent human emotions. Usually the narration in a ballad is not
straight forward story-telling from beginning to end - the story in a ballad
is communicated in a few dramatic word pictures with vivid details with
much of the actual happenings let to be learnt by implication.
This poem tells a story of conflict and death as in many traditional ballads.
A young man has killed his brother. We are not told why; the poet has
focused his interest on the state of mind of the young man. This state of
mind is given to us through the words of the young man. The whole poem
is this young murderer's farewell to a friend named Terence.

Overview
Narrator – Terrance (in reported speech)
setting – pastoral
structure – ballad form
Rhyme scheme – ABAB
Tone – nostalgic, remorseful
Theme – sudden impulse brings grief and regret

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Deep-end analysis of the poem
“Farewell to barn and stack and tree,
Farewell to Severn shore.
Terence, look your last at me,
For I come home no more.

anaphora – farewell (delaying his farewell, he is not willing to leave but

has to)
anastrophe – look your last at me (inversion of natural order of words,
suggesting his hesitation or confusion)
assonance – for I come home no more (emphasizes about his departure)
enjambment – run on line (forces reader to go through the lines to know
what happens next; increases pace and suspense in the poem)
alliteration – seven shore
farewell (good bye in old English) bidding goodbye to inanimate objects
suggests that he avoids human contacts and they have a close connection
to his life.
Severn – is the largest river in UK

In the beginning the reader is seen a farewell speech of a speaker whose

words are directly presented as direct speech form. He bids farewell to
inanimate objects and places: which must be very close to his life. His
intention of not returning is clearly shown by his repetitive utterances.
Reader may feel sympathetic about him and be curious to know what
really has happened. His hesitation is an implication that he has made the
decision without his will. His friend Terence seems to be a closer friend
of him as he bids farewell to him in an intimate way.

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“The sun burns on the half-mown hill,
By now the blood is dried;
And Maurice amongst the hay lies still
And my knife is in his side.

tactile imagery: sun burns on the half mown hill (reader feels the heat of
the sun which dried the blood)
visual imagery: blood is dried/Maurice lies still among the hay/knife in
his side
personification – sun burns (it too has word play, if we put son instead
of sun, it implies the suffer and grief of the brother who killed his brother)
metaphor – sun burns (in metaphorical level sun burns means the
midday)
symbol – half mown hill, blood (half mown suggests that the boys have
completed only a part of their lives, one is dead by now and other has
ruined his life, blood is a symbol to death)
euphemism – Maurice amongst the hay lies still / my knife is in his side
(The effect of death and killing is reduced to imply that the brother has
committed the crime unintentionally, he repents over his work)
anastrophe – Maurice amongst the hay lies still. (shows his reluctance
to reveal his crime)
anaphora – and (shows urgency)
enjambment – 3rd and 4th line (forces reader to read the next line
quickly to resolve a problem) here reader finds out who killed Maurice.
alliteration – half mown hill
possessive pronoun – my (shows that he admits his crime)

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Second stanza half - reveals the secret behind his departure. He has
Murdered a person called Maurice and he confesses that he is the
murderer. The time and place of death is hinted as somewhere before
noon as now the blood is dried and the hill is too half mown. His
hesitation and the way he reveals the death of Maurice suggests that he
has not planned this crime. The reader is kept at the edge of seats to know
more about the incident.

“My mother thinks us long away;

‘Tis time the field were mown.
She had two sons at rising day,
To-night she’ll be alone.

dramatic irony – my mother thinks us long away. (reader and the narrator
knows what has really happened but mother does not know about the
tragedy)
word pun – son (sun; son can be replaced with the word sun that gives a
sense too, mother had two suns to enlighten her life but after this incident
her life is going to be filled with darkness)
symbol – night (night is a symbol for hardships or danger)
juxtaposition – they were to mow the lawn but one killed the other. /she
had two sons at rising day, to-night she’ll be alone
subjunctive – were (shows the inability or improbability of something to
happen)
metaphor – rising day (refers to the morning)
Possessive Pronoun – my (Possessive nature is shown by possessive
pronoun; this might be the actual cause for his sudden impulse to kill his
brother)
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Third stanza further reveals about the relationship between the victim and
the culprit. He is his own brother! (Killing a brother is called a fratricide.)
Mother is yet unaware of the plight of any of her sons. The mother’s
uncertain future is brought out as she has lost both her sons. His concern
and grief about the plight of mother is too revealed.

“And here’s a bloody hand to shake,

And oh, man, here’s good-bye;
We’ll sweat no more on scythe and rake,
My bloody hands and I.

metaphor – bloody hand (He introduces his hands are stained with death;
his crime)
imagery – bloody hand
commas and pauses – shows that he is getting emotional.
His remorse is clearly visible in his confession calling his hands are blood
soaked and admitting that he can never go back to his previous life. He is
repenting over his actions which resulted him to lose his way of life
forever.

“I wish you strength to bring you pride,

And love to keep you clean,
And I wish you luck, come Lammastide,
At racing on the green.

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anaphora – and (increases the pace of the poem, the narrator wants to
finish the story quickly)
juxtaposition – bring you pride/ love to keep you clean (he contrasts his
stained life with his hope his friend to have a clean life)
symbol – green (green symbolizes better life)
Lammastide – a holiday celebrated on August 1st to mark the wheat
harvest
His concern for his friend a better future sharply contrasts with his lost
future. Because of his crime, he can never be clean nor proud. His future
intention to meet his friend in Lammastide is hinted here showing the
intimate friendship they share.
“Long for me the rick will wait,
And long will wait the fold,
And long will stand the empty plate,
And dinner will be cold.”
anaphora – and long, and (emphasizes his grief and his reluctance to
leave the place where he grew and familiar to)
imagery – empty plate
symbol – empty plate (suggests his uncertain or empty life in the future)
the simple future form will – has a positive remark that one day he hopes
to come back home
His nostalgic and remorseful feeling is clearly visible by his worry to
leave his familiar places and farm. He craves for the lost- warmth of the
family and worries about what might happen next in his home. However,
this provides an anticlimax to the tragedy where the culprit understands
the depth of his crime. Therefore, this poem is in a way an eye-opener of
the reader to think before act.

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