Get out the microscope, because we’re going through this poem line-by-line.
Lines 61-64
All day within the dreamy house,
The doors upon their hinges creak'd;
The blue fly sung in the pane; the mouse
Behind the mouldering wainscot shriek'd,
- Well, here we are: back in daytime again.
- The house is described as "dreamy," though. That seems to fit the whole "sleepwalking" thing.
- The doors creak, the fly buzzes, and a mouse squeaks behind the wall.
- It's worth noting that this is definitely the most life we've seen in the poem. It's also the most action we've seen.
- Could it be signaling that life is returning to Mariana? Let's read on.
Lines 65-68
Or from the crevice peer'd about.
Old faces glimmer'd thro' the doors
Old footsteps trod the upper floors,
Old voices called her from without.
- The mice peer around the room at the woman.
- They aren't the only ones. She sees "old faces" staring at her from the doors and floors, and she hears their voices calling to her.
- Say what?
- The faces aren't "old people" but memories. She's being haunted by her own memories. She's also sounding a little bit paranoid.
- Time to go out and get some fresh air, Mariana.
- Maybe that's why there's so much anaphora happening here. She's working herself up into another trance.
- We know that hypnotists often use repetition to hypnotize people. Repeating the same words over and over may also have a similar effect on readers. Tennyson is definitely trying to get us to notice the trance-like state of her grief.
Lines 69-72
She only said, "My life is dreary,
He cometh not," she said;
She said, "I am aweary, aweary,
I would that I were dead!"
- It's refrain time again. We're back to her "life" being dreary.
- That was the subject of her first refrain, if you remember.
- Even if you don't, Mariana does. She's being visited by memories.
- When she's being visited by memories, though, she is still weary and sad. They must not be the happiest memories. They definitely aren't providing any comfort.