Question

summary of silver by walter de la mare

Answer 1

'Silver' is probably the best English poem on the visible effects of moonlight on a countryside-the whole scene is turned to silver, all still and gleaming. With the sound of a pin drop silence, the moon appears to move across the night sky. As though wearing her mysterious shoes, the moon 'walks' by passing slowly from east to west across the sky. As the moon comes over the sky of human settlements below, slowly by slowly and one by one the the windows of the houses are touched by the silver beams of the moon. Inside the kennel, the dog is lying down like a log. Only the dog's paws are 'silver' because the rest of the dog's body is within the kennel (The writer picks out particular parts of the animals' bodies as well, claws, breasts, eyes. It is as though the moonlight highlights particular parts of the animals, accentuating them). Inside the dark and shadowy shelter of dove-cote, the numerous doves sleep with their feathers exposed to the silvery light of the moon. A very small harvest mouse which lives among the corn stalks is running quickly and lightly all around the field. In the nearby waters of a stream, an unmoving fish remains underneath the gleaming waters near the reeds brightened by the moonlight. The only movements are those of the slow moon and the quick mouse. But the silver is not even skin-deep; The repetitions of the 'soft' consonants l,m,s,v, reminds us that the scene is full of sleeping life.