William Carlos Williams

The Dark Day

The Dark Day - meaning Summary

Rain That Isolates and Repeats

The poem depicts a three-day easterly rain that creates a stifling, repetitive atmosphere. Minor sounds—“talking, talking”—and persistent winds push people inward, producing isolation, stasis, and a sense of entrapment. The image of the white poppy suggests enforced inertia or numbness. Repetition and the lines about recurrence turn weather into a metaphor for cyclical, inescapable moods or events, implying a return to the same oppressive state.

Read Complete Analyses

A three-day-long rain from the east-- an terminable talking, talking of no consequence--patter, patter, patter. Hand in hand little winds blow the thin streams aslant. Warm. Distance cut off. Seclusion. A few passers-by, drawn in upon themselves, hurry from one place to another. Winds of the white poppy! there is no escape!-- An interminable talking, talking, talking . . .it has happened before. Backward, backward, backward.

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