What Were They Like? Analysis

You may have noticed that there there's not much form or meter happening in the poem. We don't see any rhyme schemes or regular meter, and the lines seem to be broken haphazardly (they aren't, as...

The poem has two speakers: one opens the poem with a series of questions, and the other closes the poem with the answers to those questions. The first speaker sounds like a reporter doing an interv...

The only clue we have about the setting of the poem comes in the first line, where the speaker asks about the people of Vietnam. The Vietnam War is often called "America's longest war," even though...

While the poem might seem more like a conversation than something by Shakespeare, Levertov does have a few sonic tricks up her sleeve. Don't believe us? Try reading the following stanzaaloud, payin...

The title gives us a clue not only about the subject matter of the poem, but also about the style. See, it's written like a question and answer session (sort of like an interview), though we never...

It's hard to miss the overall anti-war tone of the poem. After all, it depicts an entire people destroyed—along with any legacy they could have left behind—by the violence of war. That perspect...

There aren't any tricks up Levertov's sleeve here; the poem was written in plain language, with images that don't require a dictionary to decode. But you may want to reach for the history books bef...

Levertov was homeschooled by her parents; but you didn't need proof that all learning doesn't happen in the classroom, right? (Source.) Pallin' around: Levertov was friends with many of the Black M...

It's definitely a heavy poem, but not one with any heavy breathing—nothing risqué here.