The Meadow Mouse

The Meadow Mouse

  • Submitted By: eleanorkgb
  • Date Submitted: 09/30/2010 12:15 PM
  • Category: English
  • Words: 269
  • Page: 2
  • Views: 575

The Meadow Mouse by Theodore Roethke

The first two lines of this poem, ''In a shoe box stuffed in an old nylon stocking
Sleeps the baby mouse I found in the meadow '' suggests that the author has just found the mouse and has been resourceful by using simple household items to keep the mouse in. The line ''Where he trembled and shook beneath a stick '' tells us that the baby mouse it very scared.

Lines such as 'Cradled in my hand' and 'My thumb of a child that nuzzled in my palm,' are comforting and parental lines. They tell us that the poet likes mice and is a kind and caring person.

'His absurd whiskers sticking out like a cartoon-mouse' is suggesting that the baby mouse's whiskers are huge in comparison to its size, and 'His feet like small leaves' is suggesting the mouse's feet as being thin, delicate and seeing the veins.

'Now he's eaten his three kinds of cheese and drunk from his bottle-cap watering-trough' is showing that the mouse has settled in and is comfortable. The metaphor 'bottle-cap watering-trough' is saying how a small bottle top, is huge to a mouse, as a trough is quite big.

'Bat-like ears' tell us the mouse has very sensitive hearing, and his ears move in the direction of any slight sound.

The lines 'Do I imagine he no longer trembles When I come close to him? He seems no longer to tremble', is saying how the mouse now trusts the poet and knows the poet will not hurt him.

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