ANALYSING OF POETRY “CROSSING THE BAR”

1.   Poetry

Crossing the Bar

By Alfred, Lord Tennyson

Sunset and evening star,

And one clear call for me!

And may there be no moaning of the bar,

When I put out to sea,

But such a tide as moving seems asleep,

Too full for sound and foam,

When that which drew from out the boundless deep

Turns again home.

Twilight and evening bell,

And after that the dark!

And may there be no sadness of farewell,

When I embark;

For tho' from out our bourne of Time and Place

The flood may bear me far,

I hope to see my Pilot face to face

When I have crost the bar.

2.   Paraphrase

“Crossing the Bar” is not right enough if we say that author just tells he's really old, or has serious ill, or has sort of old, but he tells about the death is just around him. He keeps talking about putting out to sea (4, 12, 14-16), which sure sounds like a metaphor for death if we ever saw one. All the images of sunset and evening (1, 9-10) and sleep (5) strengthen the impression that death is coming for the speaker.

Although he's close to death, the speaker doesn’t look afraid at all. He doesn't want anybody to weep and moan (3, 11) because he's pretty confident that good stuff is waiting for him just around the bend. What good stuff? Well, in the poem's final stanza, he talks all about meeting his "Pilot face to face" (15), which tells us that he's a believer, and he's ready to meet his maker.

3.   Rhythm

The meter of "Crossing the Bar", there are three different kinds of meter. There are the meter start from small.

·         Check line 12: “When I embark.” That’s iambic dimeter.

·         Check line 2: “And one clear call for me!” That’s iambic trimeter.

·         Check line 3: “And may there be no moaning of the bar.” That’s iambic pentameter.

4.   Rhyme

“Crossing the Bar” is composed of four rhyming stanzas of four lines each. Each of those quatrains has alternating rhymes, giving the entire poem a rhyme scheme of ABAB CDCD EFEF GAGA.

5.   Figurative Language

“Crossing the Bar” has two kinds of figurative language. There are Metaphor and Personification.

Metaphor is a direct comparison of two unlike things.

Example: “Twilight and evening bell” (Line 9) both refer to a time of day, but they're metaphors for the speaker's advanced age and impending death.

Personification is an animal given human-like qualities or an object given life-like qualities.

Example: “And may there be no moaning of the bar,” (Line 3) the denotative meaning: The bar can't actually moan or anything. The connotative meaning: The bar is given human-like qualities or life-like qualities that can moan. So this is an example of personification.

6.   Symbols

A.   The Ocean

Water is everywhere. And not a drop of it is literal. That's right, folks, in this poem, the ocean is one whopper of a metaphor, representing that Great Gig in the Sky, death.

• Lines 3-4: The speaker wants there to be no "moaning of the bar" when he sets out for sea. A sandbar can't really moan, so you might call this personification. It's also a bit of a pathetic fallacy, since this sandbar seems really bummed about something. And what's got that sandbar so down in the dumps? Probably the fact that the speaker is setting out to sea, which in this poem, means he's just about to kick the bucket. 
• Line 5: When the speaker wishes for "such a tide as moving seems asleep," he's telling us that he's hoping that when he finally does die, it'll be smooth sailing—the tide will be in, and he won't run aground on that pesky sandbar. 
• Lines 7-8: The speaker describes the tide that "drew from out the boundless deep." The phrase "that which" might also refer to his soul, which is returning home to the sea, or death.
• Lines 13-14: By now, it's probably pretty clear that the idea of the flood carrying the speaker far away is a metaphor for death.
• Line 16: Here comes that pesky sandbar again. At this point, it's safe to assume that the speaker is being totally figurative here. He's not worried about an actual sandbar. He's talking about crossing the barrier between life and death.

B.    Night

Sunset. Twilight. Dark. Yep, that's pretty much how it goes when you die. First, you grow a little older, a little crustier. Then you grow really old and crusty. And finally, you reach the point of no return—full on nighttime. At least, that's how our speaker sees it.

• Line 1: The speaker opens the poem by talking about "sunset and evening star." It's the first night imagery, and it sets a tone for what will soon become a whole slew of metaphors comparing death to the coming of night. 
• Line 5: When the speaker mentions sleep here, we can't help but think of nighttime. 
• Line 9: "Twilight and evening bell" both refer to a time of day, but, like the images in line 1, they're also metaphors for the speaker's advanced age and impending death.
• Line 10: After twilight, there is nothing but "the dark." Scary, right? This creepy little line is a reminder that we have no idea what's coming when it comes to death. We're totally in the dark—pardon the pun.

C.   Sounds

For a poem about death, this one sure is noisy. Mostly, those noises are there to remind us of the human grief that surrounds death, but they're also the death knell itself—a sound to remind the speaker that it's time to go.

• Line 2: The "sunset and evening star" act like a "call" for the speaker to make his final journey from life to death. The call probably isn't literal; it seems to be a metaphor for the speaker's belief that death is headed his way.
• Line 3: The bar can't actually moan or anything, so this is an example of personification, the attribution of human qualities to non-human things. But it's also a moment in which the land itself—this sandbar—seems to be mourning for the speaker. That mourning is reflected in the sound it makes, which is really nothing more than the sound of water flowing up over the bar.
• Line 6: The speaker hopes for a tide that is "too full for sound and foam," meaning he'd like to pass quietly out into the open ocean, without much ado. No crashing of the waves, please and thank you.
• Line 9: At twilight, there's an "evening bell." The bell reminds us of the death knell—a traditional ringing of a bell to signal that a person has passed on.

D.   Sailing

If the sea represents death, well then sailing represents that long, slow journey toward death. Setting out from the safe harbor of life and into the great unknown of death is the central metaphor of "Crossing the Bar," and while it may seem obvious, it's definitely worth a closer look.

• Line 4: The speaker is putting out to sea in this line, but given all we know about the poem, we know that this means he's heading out on his final journey—toward death.
• Lines 5-8: Wanting the tide to clear the way for him, the speaker hopes for easy conditions, so he can get out of the harbor—or life—without too much ado.
• Line 12: "Embark" here has, as you've probably realized by now, little to do with actually setting sail. It's a metaphor for leaving the land of the living and heading off for the afterlife. 
• Line 14: The flood, or sea, is bearing him toward death. And once he crosses the bar, there's no turning back. 
• Line 15: The "Pilot" here refers to God. It's the perfect culmination of the sailing-as-dying metaphor, since, as the pilot of the speaker's boat, God has been steering him on this course the whole time.

7.   Subject Matter

The subject matter of this poem is about “Death” or “The death journey”

8.   Themes

There are three themes in this poem:

A.   Theme of Death

If the sandbar is Tennyson's metaphor for the boundary between life and death, then "Crossing the Bar" is all about crossing from life to death. But if you think you're in for a morbid poem, you're in for a surprise instead. This poem is all about accepting and embracing death, rather than fearing the dark unknown.

B.    Theme of Old Age

"Crossing the Bar" isn't just about death; it's also about what comes before death in most cases—old age. The references to sunset and evening in the poem remind us that the evening of the speaker's life is in full swing and that night, or death, is fast approaching. But the nice thing about old age is that it comes with its fair share of wisdom. And in this case, our speaker has grown wise enough to know that death isn't an end, but a beginning.

C.   Theme of The Home

One of the great ironies of "Crossing the Bar" is that the speaker's departure from the harbor—from life—isn't really a departure at all. In one way, the speaker seems to suggest that he is leaving a world in which he never really belonged and is finally returning home. The soul's true home is not the "bourne of Time and Place," but rather the open ocean, beyond the bar.

9.   Reason

In 'Crossing the Bar', Tennyson is speaking about his own impending death.  Within the poem, the image of the sea is used to represent the 'barrier' between life and death.  The construction of this metaphor centres on the image of 'crossing the bar'; a 'bar' is physically a bar of sand in shallow water.  Then the maen point that the author teaches us to not be afraid to death because the author wisely thinking that death is not the end but a beginning of a life of real life.