POEM SUMMARY "THE LISTENERS" BY WALTER DE LA MARE

THE LISTENERS

"Is there anybody there?' said the Traveler,

Knocking on the moonlit door;
And his horse in the silence champed the grasses
Of the forest's ferny floor:
And a bird flew up out of the turret,
Above the Traveler's head
And he smote upon the door again a second time;
'Is there anybody there?' he said.
But no one descended to the Traveler;
No head from the leaf-fringed sill
Leaned over and looked into his Grey eyes,
Where he stood perplexed and still.
But only a host of phantom listeners
That dwelt in the lone house then
Stood listening in the quiet of the moonlight
To that voice from the world of men:
Stood thronging the faint moonbeams on the dark stair,
That goes down to the empty hall,
Hearkening in an air stirred and shaken
By the lonely Traveler's call.
And he felt in his heart their strangeness,
Their stillness answering his cry,
While his horse moved, cropping the dark turf,
'Neath the starred and leafy sky;
For he suddenly smote on the door, even
Louder, and lifted his head:-
'Tell them I came, and no one answered,
That I kept my word,' he said.
Never the least stir made the listeners,
Though every word he spake
Fell echoing through the shadowiness of the still house
From the one man left awake:
Ay, they heard his foot upon the stirrup,
And the sound of iron on stone,
And how the silence surged softly backward,
When the plunging hoofs were gone.
Fell echoing through the shadowiness of the still house
From the one man left awake:
Ay, they heard his foot upon the stirrup,
And the sound of iron on stone,
And how the silence surged softly backward,
When the plunging hoofs were gone...

SUMMARY!!!!

THE LISTENERS

The poet is simple and the sense of fear is evoked through suggestion by the poet. It depicts its encounter of a man with ghosts though he is not aware of it.

It was a moonlit night. A traveler came to the door of a house in the forest. He knocked at the door calling the house-holders to open the door. Silence was the answer to his call. A bird flew out of the window above his head. He knocked an the door again but there was no answer. The traveler stood there in confusion. He did not know that there was a group of spirits listening to him. Those phantoms were dwelling in that house. They were so still that except the call of the visitor even the air was motionless. The visitor felt strange and his horse too sensed the eerie atmosphere. He move on. The visitor shouted to the stillness that he had come here to keep his promise but no one received him. His words echoed in the house but the spirits stood silently. He left the place and the horse galloped away.

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BY WALTER DE LA MARE