Succinct analysis of the poem 'This Is The Dark Time My Love'.

1. This is the Dark Time My Love – Facts
Main Idea: The poem is about a country going through oppression and misery when foreign
people or soldiers invade their country.
Reference: The poem describes the turbulent period in British Guyana’s history when the
people were resolutely advocating and pushing for independence from Britain.
England then decided to deport soldiers and officers to subdue the commotion
and the voices of the people. Because of this the people were afraid to even
express themselves and fight for their dream “independence.” Many people
were arrested including the writer, Martin Carter, for expressing their discontent
at Britain’s governance.
Genre: Elegy
Themes: Sorrow, Unrest, War
Mood: Tension, Fear, Sorrow, Anxiety
Imagery: The images appeal to the sense of sight and sound. They present visual pictures
and are striking. The picture of the soldiers, “all around the land the brown
beetles craw about”, in their thick armoury, the hand covering on their backs is
like beetles.
Here you hear the tramping of soldier “whose boots of steel tramp down the
slender grass”. You can also see the slender grass trampled upon and looking
withered. “Red flowers,” are used as a symbol of sorrow, whilst you can also
imagine the “Shining Sun.”
Stanza 2 is host to a bit of imagery where dark metal symbolizes weaponry, and
tears indicate a mood of sorrow. The faces of men being described as strained
and anxious show the stress that the people were going through.
Shifts: In stanzas 1 the narrator talks about the soldiers and the people whilst stanza 2
focuses on the country and how it along with its people is being affected. The
last stanza focuses purely on the soldiers and how they are hindering the people
from obtaining their dream of independence.
Devices: Metaphors:
 “All around the land brown beetles crawl about.” The soldiers are
being compared to brown beetles.

2. Irony:
 “It is the festival of guns, the carnival of misery.” The words
festival and carnival are indicative of joyous celebrations but what
the country is really experiencing is sorrow not joy. This line is also
a juxtaposition of two ideas.
Personification:
 “Red flowers bend their heads in awful sorrow.” The poet gives
the flowers qualities of a human being – the emotion of sorrow
and the ability to “bend their heads.”
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