read the poem 'wind' and analyse it using the SWIFT technique
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Answer:
Wind is a poem full of imagery, forceful language and movement. It is a typical Ted Hughes poem in that it explores the idea of struggle with and within nature, the first person speaker directly connecting the reader with the monstrous power of the wind.
This poem evokes a sense of terror and danger, the wind being experienced as a threat as it hits the house and surrounding countryside, causing havoc like some primitive invader.
Throughout the six stanzas there is a tone of impending doom as the onslaught continues through the night and into the day. The relentless wind instils tension, not only in the fabric of the land but in the minds of the two people in the house.
It's a poem that creates tense drama within a timeline of night, dawn, noon and afternoon; and with metaphor, simile and other poetic devices immerses the reader in a kind of life or death situation, as is so often the case in poetry by Ted Hughes.
First published in 1957 in his first book The Hawk In The Rain, Wind continues to impress readers with its physical language and vivid imagery. There is also an immediacy about it that grabs the attention.
This is not a comfortable poem to dwell in but a thought-provoking blast that urges and prompts - what is it like to experience elemental power and what might the effect be on the vulnerable or helpless human, with little or no control