The poem explores the theme of loss through the speaker's assertion that "the art of losing isn't hard to master." Over the course of the poem, the speaker describes losing increasingly significant people and possessions, from small everyday items to loved ones and homes. By the end, it is evident the speaker has not truly mastered their sadness over losing the person referred to as "you." While insisting loss is not difficult, the poem ultimately suggests some losses are more difficult to accept than others.

2. The art of losing isn’t hard to master;
so many things seem filled with intent
to be lost that their loss is no disaster.
Lose something every day. Accept the fluster
of lost door keys, the hour badly spent.
The art of losing isn’t hard to master.
Then practice losing farther, losing faster:
places, and names, and where it was you meant
to travel. None of these will bring disaster.
I lost my mother’s watch. And look! my last, or
next-to-last, of three loved houses went.
The art of losing isn’t hard to master.
I lost two cities, lovely ones. And, vaster,
some realms I owned, two rivers, a continent.
I miss them, but it wasn’t a disaster.
—Even losing you (the joking voice, a gesture
I love) I shan’t have lied. It’s evident
the art of losing’s not too hard to master
though it may look like (Write it!) like disaster.

3. The poem begins rather boldly with the curious
claim that "the art of losing isn’t hard to master"
The speaker suggests that some things are
basically made to be lost, and that losing them
therefore isn’t a big deal. She suggests that we
get used to loss by practicing with little things,
like house keys or a little bit of wasted time
here and there; the idea is that if you’re
comfortable with the insignificant losses, you’ll
be ready to cope when the big ones come
along.
The losses mentioned in the poem grow more
and more significant. First it’s the things we try
to remember, like names and places, then
more specific items, such as a mother’s watch
or homes one has loved in the past. As these
things begin to pile up, we wonder how much
the speaker has actually mastered this so-
called "art of losing." Is she really as glib (that
is to say, smart-alecky) as she sounds, or does
she still have deep feelings about all of these
things? We’re not so sure.

4. However, the last stanza reveals a whole lot to us. We
discover that the loss that really bothers her is that of a
beloved person (friend, family, or lover, we don’t know).
She attempts rather feebly to claim that even this loss isn’t
a "disaster," though it appears to be one; at this point,
though, we see that she really is still sad about the loss,
and hasn’t truly gotten over it.

5. • Why titled as Reminisce?
• Background-
• Spiral/Gyre-
• Suitcase-
• Watch-
• Keys-
• Hand-
• Ground-
• Favourite line in the poem-

6. OUR POSTER ….

7. The art of losing isn't hard to master;
so many things seem filled with the intent
to be lost that their loss is no disaster
This stanza provides the clear opening
statement of the poem: it boldly declares that
loss isn’t a big deal, and that we should get
used to it.

8. Lose something every day. Accept the fluster
of lost door keys, the hour badly spent.
The art of losing isn't hard to master
The poem continues in a rather pedantic tone,
instructing readers to practice losing things by
losing different insignificant items every day.
The speaker tells us to "accept the fluster" that
such losses bring, presumably so we
eventually stop getting flustered by them at all.

9. The speaker brings up the kinds of things we all attempt to
remember but eventually forget.
The losses mentioned grow somewhat more significant, though they
are still vague and these losses still aren’t too important.
Then practice losing farther, losing faster:
places, and names, and where it was you meant
to travel. None of these will bring disaster.

10. I lost my mother's watch. And look! my last, or
next-to-last, of three loved houses went.
The art of losing isn't hard to master
The speaker brings in some things that she’s lost
that are obviously of some emotional significance
to her: her "mother’s watch“
Though the speaker reassures us again at the end
of the stanza that "the art of losing isn’t hard to
master"

11. I lost two cities, lovely ones. And, vaster,
some realms I owned, two rivers, a
continent.
I miss them, but it wasn't a disaster.
The losses described here are a little more esoteric
(mysterious)
The losses can be her home, place her loved one,
or represents a certain phase of her life that’s now
in the distant past.

12. -Even losing you (the joking voice, a gesture
I love) I shan't have lied. It's evident
the art of losing's not too hard to master
though it may look like (Write it!) like disaster
The lost that the speaker has been mulling
over this whole time is her beloved person
and it’s clear to see that this is one loss that
the poet hasn’t mastered.
The last line (the repetition of like, and the
interjection "Write it!" demonstrate the true
difficulty of coming to terms with loss.

14. • Line 4-5 = “Lost door keys, watch”
(misspent hours)
• Line 10 = “Watch” symbolizes her
relationship with her mother (The poet
mentions casually that she lost her
mother’s watch)
• Last stanza = “You” is the lover
Final quatrain = "Even losing you" The
speaker remarks that losing this person is
not too hard to master. The shift in attitude
by adding the word "too" shows that the
speaker has an ironic tone for herself in her
loss or perhaps her husband or someone
else close to her.

15. Personification
• Line 2-3 = The poet personifies the lost objects (read line 2-3) they want to
get lost.
Hyperboles
• Fifth tercet = "two cities...some realms I owned” describes that since she could not own,
much less lose a realm and seems to be comparing the realm to a large loss in her life
• The last line = "The art of losing isn't hard to master" suggests that the speaker is
trying to convince herself that losing things is not hard and she should not worry.

16. Imagery
When Bishop describes the
person she has lost("the joking
voice, gesture I love"), this is
imagery because it brings a
sensory experience to you and
makes you picture the person
by appealing to both your
sense of sight and your sense
of hearing.
Metaphor
Even losing you (the joking
voice, a gesture)
{metaphor for the speaker
losing his happiness}
Alliteration
"Then practice losing farther,
losing faster..."

17. Memory and the Past
The many things that the poet loses in "One Art" aren’t just concrete
objects, like house keys or watches; rather, they grow more and more
abstract, ranging from misspent hours to a lost loved one. In the world of
the poem, memory isn’t something permanent or reliable, and our pasts
are subject to the same possibility of loss as our possessions. The
memory of past acquaintances and experiences can be dropped by the
wayside as easily as any misplaced doodad, and though Bishop treats all
of her losses here with

18. SADNESS
Sadness is like the big, fat, mopey elephant in this room. In "One Art," Bishop never comes
right out and says she’s sad about the many losses mentioned in this poem – in fact, she
insists upon the opposite (see "Lies and Deceit" for more on that). Rather than dwell upon
the moment of loss or its aftermath, the poem consciously pushes sadness off to the
sidelines of the reader’s mind. However, by summoning up our own memories of lost things
and people, the poet reminds us that Sadness plays a very significant but unarticulated role
her

19. has nineteen lines, divided up into six stanzas. The first five have three lines and last
stanza has four. The form follows a very specific rhyme scheme. The poem utilizes two
rhymes – that is to say, everything either rhymes with [a] or [b] (in Bishop’s poem, all the
lines rhyme with either "master" or "intent")

20. • Triplet 1:
Line 1 – refrain 1 (rhyme a, "master")
Line 2 (rhyme b, "intent")
Line 3 – refrain 2 (rhyme a, "disaster")
Triplet 2:
Line 4 (rhyme a, "fluster")
Line 5 (rhyme b, "spent")
Line 6 – refrain 1 ("master")
Triplet 3:
Line 7 (rhyme a, "faster")
Line 8 (rhyme b, "meant")
Line 9 – refrain 2 ("disaster")
Triplet 4:
Line 10 (rhyme a, "last, or")
Line 11 (rhyme b, "went")
Line 12 – refrain 1 ("master")
Triplet 5:
Line 13 (rhyme a, "vaster")
Line 14 (rhyme b, "continent")
Line 15 – refrain 2 ("disaster")
Quatrain:
Line 16 (rhyme a, "gesture")
Line 17 (rhyme b, "evident")
Line 18 – refrain 1 ("master")
Line 19 – refrain 2 ("disaster")