Editing Poetry analysis (section)

===Imagery and symbolism===
Most poetry can be read on several levels. The surface is not necessarily the essence of the poem although in some cases (notably, the works of [[William McGonagall]]) there is little beyond the immediate. [[Allegory]], [[connotation]] and [[metaphor]] are some of the subtler ways in which a poet communicates with the reader.

Before getting seduced into explorations of subtle nuance, however, the reader should establish the theme of the poem. What is the 'story' that is being told? Not the literal story but the heart of the poem. For example: "Another" tells of a buried child; "The Destruction of Sennacherib" tells of the annihilation of an Assyrian army by divine intervention; "The Silken Tent" compares a woman to a tent. Part of this involves recognising the voice of the poem (who is speaking), and the rest of [[Rudyard Kipling|Kipling]]'s [[Just So Stories|"six honest serving men"]]: the events in the poem; when these occur; where is the 'speaker' and where do the events occur; why does the speaker speak? [[William Harmon]] has suggested that starting an analysis with: "This poem dramatizes the conflict between ..." is a key technique.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Benthall |first=Al |date=2005 |title=Worlds of Eye and Ear in the Poems of William Harmon |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/26476720 |journal=The Mississippi Quarterly |volume=58 |issue=2 |pages=277–298 |jstor=26476720 |issn=0026-637X}}</ref><!---Verdun--->

[[George Herbert]] in his poem ''Jordan (I)''<ref>Herbert pp. 68–69.</ref> asks if poetry must be about the imaginary. The poem opens:

:Who sayes that fictions onely and false hair
:Become a verse? Is there in truth no beautie?
:Is all good structure in a winding stair?
:May no lines passe, except they do their dutie
:Not to a true, but painted chair?

He was railing against the prevalent enthusiasm for [[pastoral]] poetry above all other forms (as becomes apparent in subsequent verses). Curiously, this verse uses metaphors to challenge the use of indirect approaches to their subject. False hair and a painted chair are decorations of the mundane. The winding stair is obstructive concealment of meaning. Herbert is criticising the overuse of allegory, symbolism or elaborate language.

For most poets—even the plain-speaking Herbert—metaphor is the fundamental means of communicating complexity succinctly. Some metaphors become so widely used that they are widely recognised symbols and these can be identified by using a specialist dictionary.

Allegorical verse uses an extended metaphor to provide the framework for the whole work. It was particularly prevalent in seventeenth century English but a more recent example is [[Charles Williams (UK writer)|Charles Williams]]' ''The Masque of the Manuscript'', in which the process of publishing is a metaphor for the search for truth.<ref>Ingraham</ref> Allegories are usually readily apparent because of the heavy use of metaphor within them.

The symbolism used in a poem may not always be as overt as metaphor. Often the poet communicates emotionally by selecting words with particular connotations. For example, the word "sheen" in ''The Destruction of Sennacherib'' has stronger connotations of polishing, of human industry, than does the similar "shine". The Assyrians did not simply choose shiny metal; they worked to make it so. The word hints at a military machine.

Other [[Trope (linguistics)|tropes]] that may be used to increase the level of allusion include [[irony]], [[litotes]], [[simile]], and [[metonymy]] (particularly [[synecdoche]]).