Question 1

Context

Accepted Answer

Absent from Thee is a satirical approach to the traditional love poetry, which gently mocks and makes light of the genre. The speaker ruminates on his serial unfaithfulness, all the while admitting that while he does love his partner, he also has desires he cannot ignore.

Question 2

Form

Accepted Answer

Absent from Thee is considered a song, due to its tidy use of iambic tetrameter and neat quatrain structure. Yet this is where its traditionalism ends – Absent from thee is cheeky, satirical and rather witty.  Here, a speaker (possibly Wilmott himself but who is to say?) openly admits that he has ‘torments,’ or desires, that plague him.

Question 3

Structure

Accepted Answer

Absent from Thee follows the neat rhythm of iambic tetrameter and a contained quatrain structure. Each quatrain uses two split rhyming couplets. There are some variations in the structure – Wilmott uses caesura to focus the reader’s attention on certain points, and there is at least one example of enjambment.

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Absent from Thee: A Level Pre-1900s Poetry