Baby-Movements II: "Trailing Clouds"

Question 1

themes

Answer 1

parent/child relationships and difficulties
love
family

Question 2

simile, likened to a bee, droned in tears, bess can be noisy but bees in a storm - fragile, vulnerable, dependent, seeking shelter from flower, she seeks shelter from him

even in sleep she needs support from him

Answer 2

As a drenched, drowned bee
Hangs numb and heavy from the bending flower,
So clings to me

Question 3

child cried so much or sweated from her turmoil, conveys how distressed she was

Answer 3

My baby, her brown hair brushed with wet tears

Question 4

normally shes happy and content, he might feel worried as a result, alliteration

Answer 4

And laid laughterless on her cheek

Question 5

completely and utterly dependent on him, hes grasping that reality

Answer 5

My sleeping baby hangs upon my life

Question 6

honest about parenting, the poet feels burdened, parenting is difficult and can be a burden, bee is weat and heavy and flower is burdened

Answer 6

burdened flower

Question 7

usually shes light but today shes heavy, shes usually happy and carefree but she had difficulty tonight

Answer 7

always seemed so light

Question 8

“o” slows down the poem,shes like a tree after a storm that has been battered, both of them might still be distressed after the storm/episode

Answer 8

Sways on my arm like sorrowful, storm-heavy boughs

Question 9

her hair is like leaves on a tree, soaked after the storm

Answer 9

Even her floating hair sinks like storm-bruised young leaves

Question 10

shes tired, hes tired, shes heavy on his arm, hes feeling heaviness and burden of parenthood, worry if he’ll manage the task, fearful/nervous when he realises its always his job to take care of her

Answer 10

Are a heaviness, and a weariness