After Long Silence
After Long Silence - meaning Summary
Late Reflection on Love
The poem stages a quiet reconnection after a long silence, with speakers acknowledging estrangement and the decline of others. In guarded evening surroundings they repeatedly return to the "supreme theme" of Art and Song. The closing lines link bodily decrepitude with acquired wisdom, contrasting mature understanding with the ignorance of youthful love. It reads as a reflective acceptance of change, loss, and the consolations of aesthetic conversation in later life.
Read Complete AnalysesSpeech after long silence; it is right, All other lovers being estranged or dead, Unfriendly lamplight hid under its shade, The curtains drawn upon unfriendly night, That we descant and yet again descant Upon the supreme theme of Art and Song: Bodily decrepitude is wisdom; young We loved each other and were ignorant.
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