Horses

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** Horses ** ** By Edwin Muir ** **Poem** Those lumbering horses in the steady plough, On the bare field - I wonder, why, just now, They seemed terrible, so wild and strange, Like magic power on the stony grange.

Perhaps some childish hour has come again, When I watched fearful, through the blackening rain, Their hooves like pistons in an ancient mill Move up and down, yet seem as standing still.

Their conquering hooves which trod the stubble down Were ritual that turned the field to brown, And their great hulks were seraphims of gold, Or mute ecstatic monsters on the mould.

And oh the rapture, when, one furrow done, They marched broad-breasted to the sinking sun! The light flowed off their bossy sides in flakes; The furrows rolled behind like struggling snakes.

But when at dusk with steaming nostrils home They came, they seemed gigantic in the gloam, And warm and glowing with mysterious fire That lit their smouldering bodies in the mire.

Their eyes as brilliant and as wide as night Gleamed with a cruel apocalyptic light, Their manes the leaping ire of the wind Lifted with rage invisible and blind.

Ah, now it fades! It fades! And I must pine Again for the dread country crystalline, Where the blank field and the still-standing tree Were bright and fearful presences to me.

Use the image of the horse below to annotate the poem, adding the relevant textual quotation to the appropriate part of horse. Look at the images of horses in the powerpoint attached here and write down your instincts to the various images.
 * Introductory Activity**

And now what about this image?

Having thought about horses and what they mean, consider the following questions:
 * Analysis**
 * What situation is being described in the poem?
 * Note down words / phrases that show the power of the horses
 * How do the following descriptions make the horses seem terrible and frightening:
 * o ‘Their conquering hooves’
 * o ‘mute ecstatic monsters’
 * o ‘eyes … gleamed with a cruel apocalyptic light’?
 * To what are the horses compared and to what effect?
 * What attitude does the narrator seem to have towards the horses? Is it the same throughout the poem? Explain your response.
 * What contribution does the description of the environment make to the poem?
 * Comment on the effect of the rhyme scheme.
 * What is iambic pentameter? Which words are stressed in the poem as a result of this? Why do you think that is?
 * Comment on the use of time in the poem. How is time important?
 * Read Muir’s diary extract/quotation (below). How is this relevant to the portrayal of time in the poem?
 * What is your personal response to the poem

//"I was born before the// [|//Industrial Revolution//] //, and am now about two hundred years old. But I have skipped a hundred and fifty of them. I was really born in 1737, and till I was fourteen no time-accidents happened to me. Then in 1751 I set out from Orkney for Glasgow. When I arrived I found that it was not 1751, but 1901, and that a hundred and fifty years had been burned up in my two day's journey. But I myself was still in 1751, and remained there for a long time. All my life since I have been trying to overhaul that invisible leeway. No wonder I am obsessed with Time."// //(Extract from Diary 1937-39.)//
 * Edwin Muir Diary Quotation**

[|http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p00mr8yj/profiles/edwin-muir#10] []
 * Links**


 * Revision Mind Map[[image:Horses.png width="739" height="362"]]**