I Go Back to May 1937

In the Strike Sparks version of this poem, published in 2004, the description of the “wrought-iron gate” (Line 8) differs from the version of the poem in 1987’s The Gold Cell. In the original version, the “sword-tips” (Line 9) of the gate are “black in the May air” (Line 9) whereas in the revision, they are “aglow in the May air” (Line 9). This simple change creates a potent difference in the imagery of the poem with a deliberate Biblical allusion. In the Bible, when Adam and Eve are cast out of Paradise, God stations a Cherub with a flaming sword in front of the gates to guard against re-entrance. The gate’s tips are literally “aglow” (Line 9) in the sunlight of May 1937, but symbolically, the word “aglow” (Line 9) creates a fiery image as it suggests the “sword-tips” (Line 9) are lit up by some internal and powerful force. The Biblical allusion implies that the speaker’s mother is banned from the Paradise of her youth as well as the potential of the kind of woman she could become. This image draws attention to the doors of the gate that are “still open behind her” (Line 8) but will soon be shut.