Cathedral Builders by John Ormand - English Lit A/L - Poetry 5


Cathedral Builders By John Ormand


 Cathedral Builders

They climbed on sketchy ladders towards God,

With winch and pulley hoisted hewn rock into heaven,

Inhabited sky with hammers, defied gravity,

Deified stone, took up God’s house to meet Him,

And came down to their suppers and small beer;

Every night slept, lay with their smelly wives,

Quarrelled and cuffed the children, lied,

Spat, sang, were happy, or unhappy,

And every day took to the ladders again;

Impeded the rights of way of another summer’s

Swallows, grew greyer, shakier, became less inclined

To fix a neighbour’s roof of a fine evening,

Saw naves sprout arches, clerestories soar,

Cursed the loud fancy glaziers for their luck,

Somehow escaped the plague, got rheumatism,

Decided it was time to give it up,

To leave the spire to others; stood in the crowd

Well back from the vestments at the consecration,

Envied the fat bishop his warm boots,

Cocked up a squint eye and said, ‘I bloody did that.’



Themes

1.     This poem delineates human perseverance and achievements, their unnoticed, untiring work and commitment in building Cathedrals.

2.     A sense of pride in their achievement.

3.     Contemptuous attitude towards Bishops.

4.     Social exclusion

5.     Labouring

6.     The link between honesty and godliness.

7.     Social class

Techniques

·       Simple clear language

·       Tone (An Optimistic tone)

·       Colloquial language

·       Imagery

·       Metaphor

·       Free verse language

·       Alliteration

For comprehension discussion, you can follow the link bellow. 


This Poem draws the exact theme of the Sinhala song, " මේ තරම් සියුමැලිද කළු ගල් හිතන්නටවත් බැරි නිසා" Sung by Sunil Edirisinghe. 

References:

AL resource book provided by NIE, www.poemanalysis.com, www.owlcation.com


Comments

Post a Comment