Metaphorical Uses of ‘Red’ in Poetry
Poetic Uses of Metaphor
The poetic uses of metaphor, “red” to describe the fact that they would be burning. But in reality, to the poetic, is it not sad that it had just burned, but burning in “a miserable hut?” Surely a farmer who lives in the country, as indicated by the verse: “at the edge of a path,” and not in the city, at the home of someone who is well accommodated. That would be the real shame.
Multiple Interpretations
Then, it leads to another possibility: the fact that it was torn by a whirlwind. The term “whirlwind” can have two meanings. As the tree is located in the Douro river, the movement of water from a watercourse is called a whirlwind, like the rotation of the air. The verse: “and broken the breath of the white mountain;” could be explained if the poet, or the picture he paints, is found in the passage of the Douro by Soria, and that this “blow” might result from cold air coming from the snowy mountains of the Iberian system. Or, it may be that the poetic concerns the future arrival of winter.
And the last case exposes is that the elm can be dragged by the strong current of the river, which is in its upper course and has plenty of flow until it is left at sea after its long journey through valleys and canyons.
Poet’s Desire
Finally, the poetic makes us aware of their desire. He expressed it in the two following lines: “Elm, I note in my wallet the grace of your growing green industry.” After having seen the sorry state of the elm and the small spark that saw the outbreak, poetic writing to save a memory of the wonderful fact.
But in reality, it may seem a contradiction. It has done in the same poem so that it has left this sentence to the end when he has spoken at length of the tree. And it seems that the poem has not been made intentionally, but simply in the mind of the author. This gives expressive sincerity and truthfulness to the poem. The poetic, although the entire tree has been described in general, the main idea in which you focus and you want to finish the poem is in the emergence of these new green leaves, with the grace of your branch ‘Verdeca.’ That is, the beauty of a branch that qualifies as “verdant,” or colored by the vivid green of new leaves.
Hidden Hope and Metonymy
In the last three verses, the poetic seems to deviate a little from the specific issue of the elm: “My heart is waiting to the light and to life, another miracle of spring.” These three verses seem to reflect a desire or hope of the poetic, like all the previous poem had been an example for himself to help him maintain hope. When encouraged and says, “my heart” is referring to his soul, his feelings to him, my poetic. The resource uses metonymy, the part for the whole. And “Waiting,” he says, “another miracle of spring:” the first appearance of green leaves in the dead tree. But in fact, it comes to discovering not what you’re waiting, though, yes, must go “… into the light and to life.”
Maybe it regards the emergence of a new life, while another goes at the end of old age. And the term spring could have a double meaning, referring metaphorically to the young, fresh, and vital. Who knows if the poet Machado recalled his childhood and youth as he walked along the Duero?