Promises Like Pie Crust.

a poem by Christina Rossetti

1. Describe the form and structure of the poem. What is the occasion of the poem? What two reasons does the speaker give for refusing to promise a committed love? What compromise does she suggest at the end?
   The poem is written in iambic pentameter with alternating rhyme. In the poem the speaker tells her lover why she will not exchange vows with him. Her reasons are they do not know each other’s pasts and have uncertain futures. She suggests instead that they remain friends.
2. Analyze the effect on meaning of such devices as syntax, repetition, parallelism, and paradox.
   Promises and promise are repeated in the title and first few lines of the poem as well as in the third stanza. This endorses the speakers point of view. Throughout the poem words are repeated within lines such as “never false and never true” and “free to come and free to go.” The first is a paradox, the second a manifesto which suggests that the person the speaker is addressing has the liberty to do either. Syntax is a factor in lines 7 & 8 when the speaker states, “For I cannot know your past/ And of mine what can you know?” suggesting that what is true for her also applies for him. Parallelism is present in the beginning of the third stanza with the repetition of promise previously noted. This suggests that either of them might regret the vow if they go through with it.
3. Analyze the effect on meaning of the imagery and figurative language.
   In line five the speaker states, “let us hold the die uncast” implying she would rather stay only friends and not take the chance of not liking the outcome of taking their relationship further. In lines 9 and 10 warm refers to her lover’s past relationships and cold refers to her current feeling towards this man. Sun and sunlight refer to love she once felt.