Sicilian Emigrants Song - Analysis

Introduction

The poem reads as a short, songlike lament by a Sicilian emigrant who contrasts a remembered homeland with his present, colder surroundings. Its tone moves between nostalgic warmth and a mournful, homesick grayness, with occasional bursts of exuberant exclamation. The voice is intimate and direct, addressing a beloved Donna or Maria while alternating dialectal refrains and devotional exclamations. The overall mood shifts from sunny reminiscence to sober resignation, ending with a vow of continued song and a prayerlike exclamation.

Contextual note

William Carlos Williams, an American modernist with close interest in everyday speech and immigrant life, often captured small scenes of contemporary America. This poem reflects early 20th‑century immigration experiences—geographic displacement, cultural memory, and the mingling of vernacular and religious language typical of Italian Catholic immigrants in the United States.

Main themes: longing and displacement

A central theme is longing for the homeland. The repeated images of “Blue is the sky of Palermo” and “the little bay” evoke a specific, idealized place the speaker misses. The contrast with the present “Gray is the sky of this land” underscores emotional and physical displacement, turning color into an index of belonging and alienation.

Main themes: memory and singing as survival

Memory and song function as survival strategies. The speaker repeatedly asserts that he sang and will sing—“I sang thee by the blue waters; / I sing thee here”—so music preserves identity and comforts across space. The promise to continue singing after the landing suggests resilience and ritual continuity despite migration.

Imagery and symbolism: color, the sea, and the candle

Color symbolism is prominent: blue connotes warmth, vitality, and home; gray signals foreign chill and loss. The sea ties both places—Palermo’s bay remembered fondly and the emigrant’s present waters that are “gray and green”—suggesting movement, passage, and the ambivalence of crossing. The “big woman there with the candle” is a striking, ambiguous image: possibly a maternal or saintly figure (an allusion to religious processions or to a mother waiting), which connects private grief to communal or devotional ritual and emphasizes feminine presence in the speaker’s memory and present care.

Language and voice: dialect and devotion

The refrains—O—EH—lee, La—la, Hey—la—and the direct address to Donna/Maria give the poem a musical, folkloric quality and root it in oral tradition. The ending invocations—“O Jesu, I love thee! Donna! Donna! Maria!”—blend romantic and religious registers, suggesting that love for person, place, and faith are intertwined in the emigrant’s consciousness.

Conclusion

Williams’s short song captures the tight knot of memory, music, and migration: vivid sensory recollection resists the dullness of the new land, while song and prayer sustain identity. The poem’s spare contrasts and repeated refrains make nostalgia both personal and communal, leaving an open question about how ritual and memory will reshape the speaker’s future in the new place.