summary of poem work by Wladzmir Paulau
Answers
"Michael" is an extended ballad, pastoral in nature, dealing with rural life and shepherding. A long poem of 491 lines, it appeared at the end of Lyrical Ballads. The story involves an aged father, Michael, and his younger wife, Isabel. The couple has one son, Luke, whom they raise lovingly to take over their property with devotion to the simple ideals they have lived by. Their setting is lonely and isolated as they concentrate their lives and energies on themselves. The story seems familiar as part of the folklore of the area, which as the poet says is, "homely and rude," meaning down to earth and unpolished.
The story is of a man who became a father late in life and the cares he and his somewhat younger wife take to form the family bond. They became legendary for the great work they expended on their rocky land and their devotion to it. Isabel hung a lamp "by the chimney's edge," which became a familiar sign in the area. It signaled their uncounted hours of labor, called in the poem "a public Symbol of the life the thrifty pair had lived." Their homestead was called by all "The Evening Star."
Michael, the father, gave great attention to the child as a baby and youth, sharing duties with his wife, so that Luke grew up with two close parents. Michael and Luke often sat by a huge oak called the Clipping Tree and tended the sheep. When Luke was old enough, he had to be sent, against all their desires, to work in the city to pay off an obligation Michael had incurred in good faith. Years before he had to stake his ownership of his land because his nephew had run up debts by ill luck, and no one else could help. To hold it for Luke, he would have to come up with a large sum or have the land seized.
The family struggles emotionally with the decision to separate, but both parents eventually find peace with sending Luke to work in the city for another relative, in the hope he can earn enough to settle the legal claim. To comfort them all, Michael lays a large rock at the spot where he promises Luke they will together build a new sheepfold, or shelter for the sheep, upon his return. Nothing will touch the spot in his absence. But after a time Luke falls victim to the temptations of city life, loses his direction and family devotion, and disappears. Michael and Isabel wait faithfully for their son, but their own lives reach their end, and he never returns. Michael is comforted by his loyal dog for some years, but he dies at 80, and Isabel follows him three years later.
In time everything changes around their land, The Evening Star cottage is demolished, and they live on only in legend. But the stone placed by the father for his son, as well as the giant oak tree, remain as reminders they were there at all.
Summary:
The father is distressed that he cannot find a quiet place to focus on his work as his little son comes to him to plead him to read stories.
But everytime he comes to listen to the stories to his father, the father says he cannot read the book as he is working. His Daddy says that if he gets time he will read the book to him. The son walks away but thinks when that time will come an his Daddy will be free.
But soon, the son peeks through the half-open door to complaint about how his Daddy is not working but only thinking. The father gets saddened by the thought that his son is perhaps ashamed of him because th child thinks his daddy is lying to him.
But Daddy teaches her son the real value of thinking, just not for oneself, but for others as well. And a work needs thinking.
Then finally, he opines that people learn as they grow. It take time. So they do not think when they are young. And that is why the father advises and teaches the son to keep thinking from now to the future laying ahead of him.