The first paragraph of Plenty by Isobel Dixon gives an introduction of the general idea of her poem, which is her relationship with family members. When she talks about her sisters she included the pronoun ‘us’; “When I was young there were five of us” this suggests that they have strong bonds between one another and that their relationships are hard to destroy.
In the second sentence into the poem, there is a contrast, “all running riot to my mother’s quiet despair”. This line explains the thought Dixon has towards her mother which, again, explains the sort of connection between them. She deliberately …show more content…
Verse five line one stands out among the other lines because she tells the readers the kind of person she thought her mother was; “We thought her mean. The use of past tense in this context gives away that this is only what she used to think. The controversial point Dixon made is when she writes a part from a grown up’s viewpoint rather than from a little girl's. We can see it in the fourth stanza, last line where she says "her mouth a lid clamped hard on this" in which she indicates that even though she doesn’t appreciate the way her mother was being firm to her, her maturity has now made her respect what her mother had done. She admires the level of her mother's patience and toleration. Her mother’s mouth is a metaphor for the maximum limit of her endurance. It is clamped hard to prevent all the worries, problems and troubles spilling out. This is what holds the family together and it explains how much affection her mother has for her …show more content…
It is beautiful and dreamy like the ending in a fairy tale story. Additionally, by including the word “I thought” makes it even clearer that this is what she yearns for, what she needs. However she summarises at the end that it never happened and never will by quoting “I must learn to forgive my mother, now that I’m helpless to spare my son.” This is an indication of the fact that she had become everything she hated about her