19 pages • 38-minute read
Meeting at Night
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Symbols & Motifs
Darkness and Light
Darkness and light are recurring motifs in both stanzas, first in nature and then in the enclosed human world. The atmosphere of darkness is apparent immediately with the “grey sea and the long black land” (Line 1). This, of course, is how the landscape appears at night. However, the darkness is not absolute. The half-moon that hangs low in the sky brings some welcome light and symbolically anticipates, given the long association in poetry and song between moonlight and romantic love, the two lovers. The moonlight also catches the wavelets that are stirred up in the water as the boat approaches land, and the man perceives them as “fiery ringlets” (Line 3)—little flashes of light in the gray of the sea. Thus nature, while calm and dark, shows also gleams of light. In Stanza 2, the human world seems to follow nature’s lead. Darkness envelops and pervades the house, but this is broken by the sudden spurt of light produced by the striking of the match. The recurring imagery of darkness and light thus suggests the coming of the brightness of love into the otherwise mundane lives of the lovers.
Silence, Isolation, and Secrecy
The combination of silence, isolation, and secrecy is a motif that envelops the first stanza and extends, with some modification, to the second. The images of nature in the first stanza are visual rather than auditory, and the natural scene is presented as quiet and at rest: the sea, the long stretch of land, the moon, the waves (stirred into a little movement by the boat), the cove, and the sand. The scene is deserted; the only living presence is the solitary man journeying to meet his lover, so he is an isolated figure, set against the larger backdrop of nature. Secrecy is his order of business; he does not want to be discovered by anyone. The woman who appears in the second stanza is isolated too, enclosed within the silence and darkness of the farmhouse. Here are two separate lives about to be united, at least for the night, with all secrecy maintained, as their isolation from the rest of society continues. Then, the silence of the natural environment finally gives way first to the sound of the match being struck, the softness of the woman’s voice in greeting, and the two beating hearts.
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