The speaker of the poem is a young man reflecting on his childhood and his aunt's life. He recalls singing songs at the piano for Leftist party guests during the 1930s. As he matures, he questions his developing sexual identity, viewing his interactions with his aunt through a complex lens of curiosity and emotional distance. He functions as a visionary poet attempting to preserve fading memories of the past against the conformity of the present era.

Aunt Rose is a physically frail but deeply passionate woman living in New Jersey during the speaker's childhood. Despite suffering from rheumatism and a leg injury, she actively organizes and collects money for Leftist causes, specifically supporting the Spanish loyalists. She experiences years of loneliness and sexual frustration, yet maintains a motherly devotion to her nephew. Her aging body parallels the fading of the revolutionary spirit of the 1930s.

Louis is the speaker's father and a poet whose work is published by Liveright. He represents the intellectual and creative environment of the speaker's childhood. In the present timeline of the poem, his books, such as The Attic of the Past and Everlasting Minute, are out of print, signifying the loss and passage of time.

The infamous dictator of Nazi Germany. In the poem, the speaker tells his dead aunt that Hitler is dead, using the historical figure as a symbol of the fascist threat that loomed during the 1930s. His death represents the end of an era of ideological battles.

A famous nineteenth-century writer whom the speaker imagines existing alongside other historical figures in death. She serves as a mysterious female figure in the poem's spontaneous chain of allusions, acting as a potential parallel to Aunt Rose herself.

A medieval warlord and literary figure based on the real-life Timur. The speaker associates him with Hitler in the afterlife, connecting his historical aggressiveness and delusions of grandeur to the fascist threats of the twentieth century.