Ruth Whitman's Castoff Skin

The word "once" that ends the stanza in any case sounds alike "s". Such make use of of alliteration mimics the hiss or slithering sound often made by a ophidian. The garner "s" also helps roll sounds from unmatchable word to the next in a fluid and strong motion much like a snake moves. The use of alliteration to achieve this effect is also used in the second stanza: "she", "stretched", "transparence", "kissed", "snake", and "his", (Whitman 1966). Like in the first stanza, the second stanza ends with a word that does not include the letter "s" but sounds like it does, "motion" (mo-shun).

The metaphor of the snake suggests that the speaker system of the poem likens someoneity to a shedding of our tender " disrobe". Much as Shakespeare used the phrase " person coil", so the old woman leaves crapper her mortal form that has become thin and paper-like, like the shed skin of a snake. The essence of the snake continues on in a incompatible form, but the snake's transparent shell remains scum bag much

Though we win only a few brief details astir(predicate) the woman in the poem, we can tell a salient deal about her from them. She is very old, nearly 100, but she has a "good effigy" and is "girlish" like in her sleep, (Whitman 1966). The speaker tells us she kisses the woman's "paper cheek", (Whitman 1966).

This suggests that the woman is quite unaccented and her skin is transparent in gradation much like the transparent skin left behind by a snake's shed skin. The speaker seems to take a friendly tone toward the old woman. She has known the woman for a while, as she tells us that "once" the woman told her she had a "pretty good figure for an old lady", (Whitman 1966). She expresses affection for the woman and sadness everyplace her passing in her kiss of the woman's cheek. Finally, the woman's death seems to have an concern on the speaker's thoughts on mortality, since she describes the woman as leaving behind her mortal skin much like a snake leaves behind its shed skin. This implies she takes some comfort in the companionship that the old woman is reborn in some different form even thoug
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