Summons to Love W. Drummond of Hawthornden

3 years ago
6

2 Summons to Love
The second poem in the collection (* additional details below; after my initial, un-schooled, interpretation)

*The man, I understood to be on his death-bed, seems to only feel like that when his love interest does not show up for him... in the grove (not grave).

https://scholarcommons.sc.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1194&context=ssl

There is much in this poem that could be analyzed: the above website writes this:
"The same arrest of feeling in its own sensation occurs in Song ii, "Phoebus
arise," in which Drummond eagerly awaits Auristella, only to say in the
last line that she has not turned up.31 This preserves the feeling of
expectation from the fulfillment that would end it. It pickles it in regret."

NOTES FROM THE BACK OF THE BOOK:
"Rouse Memnon's mother: Awaken the Dawn from the dark Earth and the clouds where she is resting. Aurora in the old mythology is mother of Memnon (the East), and wife of Tithonus (the appearances of Earth and Sky during the last hours of Night). She leaves him every morning in renewed youth, to prepare the way for Phoebus (the Sun), whilst Tithonus remains in perpetual old age and grayness.

by Peneus' streams: Phoebus loved the Nymph Daphne whom he met by the river Peneus in the vale of Tempe. This legend expressed the attachment of the Laurel (Daphne) to the Sun, under whose heat the tree both fades and flourishes. It has been thought worth while to explain these allusions, because they illustrate the character of the Grecian Mythology, which arose in the Personification of natural phenomena, and was totally free from those debasing and ludicrous ideas with which, through Roman and later misunderstanding or perversion, it has been associated.

Amphion's lyre: He was said to have built the walls of Thebes to the sound of his music.

Night like a drunkard reels: Compare Romeo and Juliet, Act II. Scene 3: "The gray-eyed morn smiles," etc.—It should be added that three lines, which appeared hopelessly misprinted, have been omitted in this Poem."

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