if you like my poems let them

if you like my poems let them: analysis

Introduction

"if you like my poems let them" is a six-line address from a poet to a reader. It asks a small favour: let the poems follow you in the evening, "a little behind you". If you do, people will take you for a princess on the way to her lover, attended by tall servants.

The poem is a compliment, a boast and a joke about what poems are for. The poems are cast as servants, and "ignorant" ones at that. They lend the reader grandeur, but they know nothing of where the reader is going.

Summary

The speaker addresses whoever is reading, and the opening is conditional: "if you like my poems". The request begins "let them", and the line break holds it back for a moment. The next line says what they should do. They should "walk in the evening", and walk "a little behind you". So the poems are pictured on foot, following the reader at a short distance as the day ends. All the reader has to do is like them and take them along.

The second stanza gives the result, beginning "then people will say". Their words follow inside quotation marks. They report "Along this road i saw a princess pass". She was "on her way to meet her lover". An aside in parentheses adds the time, "toward nightfall". The report ends by naming her company, "tall and ignorant servants". So the reader has become a princess in the eyes of strangers, and the poems have become her attendants.

Themes and meaning

Poems here change how a reader looks to others. They teach and explain nothing. They turn someone on an evening walk into "a princess", and the "you" of line 2 becomes the princess of line 4, whoever that reader is. The promise is generous.

The poem's modesty is double-edged. Calling the poems "tall and ignorant servants" sounds humble. But "tall" is a boast, and servants of any kind imply a household of rank. The condition "if you like my poems" also limits the compliment to readers with the right taste. The poem flatters its reader, and it flatters itself through that reader.

Love is the destination, and the poems stop short of it. The princess is going "to meet her lover", and the poems only go with her. They stay behind her and, being "ignorant", do not know where she is going. This can be read as saying that words attend love and cannot replace it.

The poem also turns on how things look from outside. Everything grand comes at second hand, in what "people will say". The witness's words form a small story, complete with road, time of day and attendants. The poet never calls the reader a princess directly. The glory depends on being seen, and on the poems keeping "a little behind".

Tone

The tone is light, courteous and slightly amused. The phrase "if you like my poems" makes no claim that you will. The request is modest, and the position "a little behind you" shows tact.

The second stanza lifts into a storybook manner, with a princess, a road and a lover. The aside "(it was / toward nightfall)" has the easy voice of a witness recalling details. The last phrase breaks the spell a little, because "ignorant" is funny in such a setting. Its humour is affectionate and not harsh. The speaker smiles at the poems without disowning them.

Form and structure

The poem has 6 lines in 2 stanzas, of 2 and 4 lines. It has no true rhyme, only the eye rhyme of "pass" and "was", and no fixed metre. Line lengths run from 5 to 12 syllables.

Line 4 has 10 syllables and falls into iambic pentameter: "Along this road i saw a princess pass". That regular beat gives the quoted speech an older, story-telling sound. The rest loosens, and line 6 stretches to 12 syllables, giving the servants room. The punctuation sits tight against the words, as in "evening,a" and "lover(it", with no space between. The poem is one long sentence, with its only full stop at the very end.

Poetic devices

Direct address line 1

if you like my poems The poem speaks straight to its reader and starts with a condition. The word "if" gives the speaker a modest air and also selects the audience.

Enjambment line 1

let them The line ends before the reader knows what the poems are to be allowed to do. The pause makes the following image arrive as a small surprise.

Personification line 2

walk in the evening The poems are given legs and can go out of doors. They leave the page and join the reader's ordinary life.

Spacing line 2

evening,a little behind you The missing space after the comma keeps the phrase moving. The poems follow close, and the small joining of words enacts it.

Framing line 3

then people will say This short line sets up a poem inside the poem. It moves the reader's grandeur out to imagined witnesses, which makes it seem more real.

Alliteration line 4

princess pass The repeated p gives the phrase a stately, measured step. It also marks the most regular line in the poem.

Parenthesis line 5

lover(it was An aside begins directly after the word lover and runs over the line end. Its casual note stops the scene from growing too solemn.

Imagery line 6

toward nightfall The time of day adds romance and a little mystery. Fading light also explains why onlookers could take a reader for a princess.

Metaphor line 6

tall and ignorant servants The poems become attendants who look impressive and understand nothing. The pairing of adjectives holds both the boast and the joke.

Words worth knowing

ignorant

Here it means unknowing, not stupid or rude. The servants do not know what their mistress is doing or why.

Context

It was Poem of the Day on February 22, 2007.

What readers have said

• Dave thinks that however beautiful you find the poems, the poet is saying you are better, more graceful and stylish, with you as the princess and the poems as tall servants. Dave, 2005
• Blake senses an underlying pride beneath the compliment, because having the taste to like these poems is made to mean belonging to high society. Blake, 2006
• The commenter signing as She finds it hopeful: words can never truly explain love, but they can encourage you to seek a real relationship. She, 2007
• ea thinks the poet is, in a cute way, congratulating himself as well as the reader, and sees the poems attending the reader while unaware of being needed. ea, 2007
• Sanra takes the part of the princess, with the poet as an admirer offering a sensual gift, and says that the poems are dumb servants, so she must seduce her lover herself. Sanra, 2007