Lord Alfred Tennyson’s Crossing the Bar Essay

Lord Alfred Tennysons mark the Bar is an allegory of finis, imagined as a journey on an distance sea. The speaker in the verse, who is the author himself, muses on the call that urges him to cross the forbid. The whole work is therefore constructed on this principal metaphor, the crossing of the gumption barrier and the plunge into the infinite journey on the sea. What is significant in the poem is the way in which Tennyson perceives death. While death is usually comprehend as closure, in Crossing the Bar it is understood as a religious encounter.Death is not only the resolution of mundane look but also the lead offning of the afterlife. The imagery of the poem is extremely apocalyptical for the death theme. Notably, the poet does not focus on the end of life and the smart of separation, but only on the experience that expects him after death. The fact that death is pictured as a threshold and afterlife as a vast sea indicates that the author embarks on this journey with by regret. The journey is meant to begin at twilight, which again alludes to the end of life and the beginning of a modernistic experience Twilight and evening bell, / And after that the dark (Tennyson 203). The poet also emphasizes that there should be no mourning to accompany him, as he crosses the bar. This liking enhances the poets optimistic view of death. The only sound to be heard, that of the abeyant tide, is also symbolic. First of all, the drowsiness of the sea emphasizes the idea of death. Also, the retractile driving of the waves expresses the idea that the idea that the traveler will not return from his excursion this time. Death will only be the beginning of eternity and the poet will find the divinity on the other side For tho from out our borne of Time and PlaceThe flood may bare me far, I wish to see my Pilot face to face When I have crost the bar. (Tennyson 203) The mooring after death cannot be mapped by earthly coordinates, such as time and place. Interes tingly however, there remains one valid water parting which ensures that the poet will never get lost or suffer in solitude the pilot. The pilot is obviously a symbol for the spiritual counselor-at-law offered by the divinity in both earthly existence and in the afterlife. Thus, Tennysons Crossing the Bar is a metaphorical representation of death, as a voyage into the infinite unknown.The sand bar represents death, while the immeasurable sea is the symbol of everlasting life. The most striking figure of the poem is the pilot, an image of the divinity, who awaits the poet on the other side. The boundless sea lacks any earthly coordinates, while it retains only that of spiritual guidance. Through this poem, Tennyson represents death as a passage into a purely spiritual life, guided by God. ? plant life Cited Tennyson, Lord Alfred. Selected Poems (New Oxford English Series). New York Oxford University Press, 1963.