Water
Think more Blue Lagoon than Waterworld. The water images in this poem are all about love. Many of the water images come at the beginning of the poem, which could be related to springtime and n...
Time
Since we already know the poem's structure is based on an ancient calendar, it shouldn't be such a surprise that time is a key player here. Everything from Time, like the scary infinity that keeps...
Plants
There are all kinds of plants growing in this poem—trees, flowers, ivy, you name it. This might be a way of bringing nature in, as she's beautiful and fertile, like the beloved, but she can also...
The Body
The body is the way that we get to know the beloved and the speaker, it's the basis for a lot of the metaphors the poem uses, and, in the end, and it's the way that the speaker finally finds some r...
Birds
Among all the animals mentioned in the poem, birds definitely get most of the attention. And who can blame the speaker? Birds are awesome. But besides being cool, they also represent life, youth, a...
Architecture and Rooms
Any architectural features like hallways, rooms, pillars, and arches are almost always describing the surroundings of the speaker. His beloved is connected to water and nature, and he's trapped ins...
Mirrors and Glass
In a poem that has a lot of self-reflection in it (Who am I? What's my name? Why am I dying?) it's probably not too hard to figure out where mirrors, glass, and crystal fit into the picture. Here's...
Fire
If water is related to life, then fire, its elemental opposite, is related to death. There are several images of people burning up, which is pretty creepy and violent, and which tells us a lot abou...