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A Song Of Despair By Pablo Neruda Essay

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The significance of Pablo Neruda’s use of contrasting imagery in ‘A song of despair’
In the poem “A song of Despair” Pablo Neruda attempts to showcase the significance of contrasting imagery. Neruda utilises contrasting imagery to develop our understanding of abandonment, sadness, change, and memory. The significant features Neruda uses to accomplish this include: similes, nautical imagery, floral imagery, and apostrophe.
Pablo Neruda uses contrasting imagery as a key expression of his emotions and feelings in a song of despair. The use of diction in “How terrible and brief my desire of you! How difficult and drunken, how tensed and avid.” (Neruda, 1924) Shows the feelings of Neruda, the words “terrible” and “brief” showcases the feeling of …show more content…

The use of diction in “Cold flower heads are raining over my heart, oh pit of debris, fierce cave of shipwrecked.” Shows Neruda using floral imagery of “flower heads” which has connotations of peace and relief, but pairing it with the nautical imagery of a shipwreck, which shows chaos and destruction. This is used to show the significance of contrasting imagery in terms of describing his emotions – at one point calm, and peaceful – and all of a sudden in chaos and “in pieces” as a shipwreck typically is. In addition to this the metaphor of flower heads being described as “cold” could suggest they were rained on recently, or dead. This could show the contrast between the freshness of a flower and symbol of life it is, to the image of death it now occupies. Neruda also describes his heart as a pit of debris, this shows the significance of contrast as previously the image of debris were used to show his feelings towards her, but now could represent him being the heart – hollow and empty like a pit. The use of structure is shown here as it is written in free verse, which could enforce the idea that the woman is taking the form of the water, having a fluid

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