Warning – Analysis

Taking the title into consideration, without reading the text, the reader may expect the poem to be about a warning about something that could be dangerous or difficult to pass.

Considering the layout, the poem is arranged into four stanzas: the first is the longest (composed of eleven lines), the second and the third are quatrains and the fourth, the latest one, is a tercet. The poem has twenty-two lines overall.

In the first stanza, the speaking voice tells the reader what he/she will do when he/she will be old; the poetess tells about exaggerated events and, therefore, uses an ironic tone: all these events are amplified because the poetess thinks that when you are old, nobody can say you anything.

In the second stanza, the speaking voice insists on exaggerated facts he/she will probably do when he/she will be old and on pension.

In the third stanza, the poetess comes back to the present day: she tells that now we should have normal and neutral clothes, pay our rent, set a good example for children and we must have friends to dinner and read papers. In this stanza, the tone is not ironic anymore, but becomes more serious, almost gloomy, because the poetess tells about rather monotonous, every day and usual events for “young” people.

In the fourth stanza, the latest, the speaking voice asks himself/herself if he/she should have some practice now, so that people who know he/she will not be shocked when he/she will be old.

In this stanza the tone is ironic again: asking this question, the poet tries to make the reader laugh: the speaking voice wants to prepare his/her friends and his/her acquaintances for when he/she will be old, so that they will not be shocked because of all the exaggerated events and actions that the speaking voice nominated before, as far as “wear purple” or “eat three pounds of sausages at a go” or “pick flowers in other people’s gardens”.