Classic and Contemporary Poetry: Explained

Stephen Crane's poem "Intrigue" serves as an intricate exploration of the complexities of love, as seen through a series of contrasting and often contradictory images. Written in an almost hymn-like structure, each stanza begins with the phrase "Thou art my love," providing a refrain that holds the poem together, yet each section introduces a different facet of love-from serene peace to violent storm to cold death.

The poem starts with an idyllic picture of love as the "peace of sundown," evoking nature's tranquility as a metaphor for love's power to soothe. But this peace is immediately disrupted by the second stanza, where love becomes a "storm" that "breaks black in the sky," drenching and cowering each tree. The juxtaposition of these images suggests that love is a force of both calm and chaos, capable of inciting both euphoria and devastation.

Structurally, the repetition of "Woe is me" at the end of each stanza serves as a lachrymose refrain, underlining the speaker's growing disillusionment with love. This refrain also adds a performative aspect to the poem, as if each section is an enactment of a different emotional or existential state.

One of the most striking stanzas is where love is described as "a tinsel thing" that the speaker "broke...easily," only to find that "from the little fragments/Arose my long sorrow." This presents love as something fragile and easily shattered, but its fragments can create lasting sorrow, making it both transient and indelible.

Another compelling moment comes when love is identified as "the ashes of other men's love," where the speaker "buries his face" and still professes to love them. This admission presents love as an amalgamation of past experiences and relationships, tainted but still desired. It shows love as a recycled emotion that carries the residue of past loves and yet still manages to captivate.

Perhaps the most chilling stanza is near the end, where love is personified as a "priestess" holding a "bloody dagger," signifying impending doom. This image captures the lethal quality of love, which can lead to one's emotional or even literal demise. This sense of danger is reinforced in the subsequent stanzas, where love is compared to "a skull with ruby eyes" and "death."

Crane has sculpted a mosaic of love that is at once beautiful and dreadful, offering both serenity and tempestuousness. The love depicted in "Intrigue" is not easily classified; it is neither wholly pure nor wholly corrosive. Instead, it embodies the numerous contradictions that make up human experience, and by doing so, Crane delves into the intricate nature of love itself.

In its exploration of love's multifaceted identity, "Intrigue" serves as a psychological tapestry, woven together with threads of existential pondering and raw emotion. Through its repetitive structure and vivid imagery, the poem captures the chameleon-like nature of love, always changing but always recognizable. Crane's "Intrigue" therefore provides a rich, if agonizing, vista into the human soul's experiences of love, capturing its complexities in shades both dark and light.

Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!

Other Poems of Interest...