Watching for dolphins

Title

Makes the reader think that the people were going to see dolphins

In the end, they don't

Structure

1st part shows reality
(stanzas 1 to 3)

2nd part shows a kind of "dream"
(stanzas 4 and 5)

"We should have laughed and lifted the children up"

3rd part, again, shows reality
(stanza 6)

Semantic fields

Religion

Saint

Sign

Implored

Epiphany

Ancient Greece

Dolphins

Story of how they were created

Satyrs

Themes

Environment

Loss of hope

Symbols

Chains

Represent entrapment and inprisionment

Sinking feeling

Spiritual things usually are upwards

Black water

Not knowing whats underneath

Sense of loss

Literary devises

Sibilance

Gives an idea of the context

Sea or water near

Onomatopeya

"Praying the sky would clang (...) gong and drum"

Dolphins seen as unreachable

Seen as godlike creatures

People expected that once they saw them they would hear "gongs and drums"

Sounds that apear in the bible and related to praising gods

Change of narrator

The poem starts with an impersonal narrator

He isn't part of the people that were waiting eagerly to see dolphins

Changes to a personal narrator

Isn't part of the crowd