Analysis of poem- Ways of Love

From birth to death, we are constantly striving to find the golden rule of a successful rapport with everybody, the people we come across in this world. To put it simply, it is the relationships, the way in which two or more people or things are connected, or the state of being connected. It can be a state of being connected by blood or marriage – the emotional closeness of familial love; the way in which two or more people or groups regard and behave towards each other – the platonic love that defines friendship, the profound oneness or devotion of religious love; or, an emotional and sexual association between two people – the passionate desire and intimacy of romantic love or the sexual love of Eros. Somehow, these relationships involve love – familial love, friendship love, religious love, romantic love or sexual love and other ways of love. There is no single consensus on the definition of love due to its diversity of uses and meanings, combined with the complexity of the feelings involved.

In Chung Yee Chong’s poem “Ways of Love” under the theme of relationships, the poet intends to express her emotion intensely through words and to emphasize the ways of love between man and woman, or specifically, between the persona and her lover. The poet wants to stress on the contrasting desires between man and woman – both physical and emotional love. The poet also implies the issue of gender inequality - male superiority and female subservience, especially in a love relationship.

The poem implies that she (the persona calls herself a 'woman' later) starts by telling how her lover came and appeared in her life suddenly. She compares the arrival of her love to the rain which came 'without warning'. It caught her off her guard. She then compares her lover to the sun. Her lover 'burns' and 'consumes' her. Then, she wonders, is she to just marry or accept him 'like a shadow?' She is confused. She is trying to make a decision. However, she is in two minds about the relationship. She says her lover ‘never walked over’ when she needed him most. She is ‘still standing’ and waiting there. She is trying to give him a chance, but he is not taking it. She says he had the opportunity to have her. She wants him to rescue her from her misery, but he did not obviously. The lover expressed his emotions or desires openly. He was straightforward and asked for love she could not give. She refuses and then leaves him. She emphasizes that kissing and touching don't necessarily fill in the loneliness, the empty feeling where love should be. That is not love, she says. She now feels the relationship is becoming perverse and disgusting. It is not a love relationship anymore. Love is hammered out by the disgusting sexual passion. She wants real love and that is all she wants.

The most pronounced poetic device used in this poem is symbols. A symbol is often a figure of speech in which a person, object, or situation represent something in addition to its literal meaning. The poet embeds subtle images into her work to make it deeper, richer, more meaningful and colorful. She also uses symbolism to allude to a mood or feeling without coming out and stating that particular emotion.

The poet uses symbols of the power of nature like Rain and Sun. The persona compares her lover to the rain and the sun. In Stanza 1, Line 2 the poet uses the symbol rain. She describes that her lover appears suddenly in her life like the rain which came without warning. She is swept off her feet and it is a love at first sight. Rain usually symbolizes someone in sadness or despair; it also represents a new life. But in this case, the symbolism takes the latter meaning where the arrival of her lover gives a new life to the persona. In Stanza 1, Line 4 the poet uses the symbol sun. The sun symbolism includes life, power, strength, energy, force, clarity and self. The sun is the absolute cosmic power in the universe. This shows that the persona’s lover is at dominant position in this relationship. The sun is a warming entity which also symbolizes passion, desire and sensuality burning intensely within the heart of persona. It means the persona’s lover fires her passion and heats up her heart.

Rain and Sun are dominant figures. They are symbolisms of life, either life-giving or life-destroying, in the way that they may bring energy and nourishment to earth but they also may bring drought, flood and other disasters to humankind. However, all beings must accept and face these formidable entities and always left no choice but to tolerate just as the persona in this poem. 

Three symbols, Rain, Sun and Shadow, are used in the same stanza. The poet intends to emphasize the issue of gender inequality - male superiority and female subordination, especially in a love relationship. We usually apply the symbols sun and moon to male and female. However, the persona compares her lover to the sun but herself to the shadow in Stanza 1, Line 8. These two symbols are pairs of opposites – male and female (the persona’s lover and her), heaven and earth (the sun is in the sky whereas the shadow is on the earth), extrovert and introvert (the persona’s lover expresses his desires and passions straightforwardly whereas the persona wants romantic love), light and dark (the persona’s thoughts and feelings about this relationship, she is in despair); however, the shadow needs the sun to exist. The beingness of the shadow relies on the light (the sun). This represents the sadness and gloom or a position of relative inferiority or obscurity of the persona. The persona is the shadow in the relationship, a passive figure or being emotionally oppressed, merely follows its body movement.

In Stanza 3, Line 13 the poet uses the symbols, King and Queen. They embody the perfect union, the sun and the moon, heaven and earth, and gold and silver. The king is a symbolic figure of authority and power, of sovereignty and of patriarchy. Again, the persona uses symbols to explain the love relationship – patriarchy, a social system in which the role of the male as the primary authority figure is central to social organization, and where fathers hold authority over women, children, and property. It implies the institutions of male rule and privilege, and is dependent on female subordination.

In Stanza 4, Line 2 the poet uses the symbol Bridge. The bridge is inherently symbolic of communication and union between two distinct realms. The poet uses a metaphorical bridge to imply that there is a rift between the persona and her lover. They are lack of communication or the inability to communicate effectively. Or they have conflicts, disagreements or verbal arguments. The bridges of words present between man and woman. These bridges of words have formed a gap between them, a gap that needs to be spanned in a relationship.

In Stanza 4, Line 6 the poet uses the symbol Fire. Fire consumes, warms, and illuminates, but can also bring pain and death; thus, its symbolic meaning varies wildly, depending upon the context of its use. There are a few symbolic attributes pertaining to the element of fire: energy, power, passion, action, creativity, authority, consumption, and in this context it means sexuality. The persona feels unhappy with the relationship because her lover does not show enough passion and romanticism. Her lover kisses and “touches” her without passion and she has grown numb to its call. Her lover just isn’t as passionate as she wants him to be because he expresses his love/ emotions/ desires openly and straightforwardly.

Other poetic devices such as lowercase letters, rhetorical question, repetition, punctuations such as dash and ellipsis, and line break (enjambment) can be found in this poem. These devices have implied the mood and feeling of the persona towards the relationship throughout this poem.

The poet uses lowercase letters to imply the persona’s sadness, silence, defeat and humility in this love. Her lover appears in her life all of a sudden. But then she realizes that this is not the love she wants. She is dominated by her lover in the relationship. The persona compares her to the shadow in the relationship, a passive figure or being emotionally oppressed, merely follows its body movement. The persona thinks that this is a humiliating love. The persona and her lover have different point of views on the ways of love. Her lover is more interested in physical love rather than emotional or intellectual love. She feels physiologically and emotionally burdened and unfulfilled.

Rhetorical question is used in this poem. It is a question solely for effect which does not require an answer. By the implication the answer is obvious; it is a means of achieving an emphasis stronger than a direct statement. In Stanza 1, Line 8 the persona questions the relationship. She wonders, is she to just accept the lover’s ways of love like a shadow? A shadow that has no say, has purpose, has no will to do anything. A shadow merely follows the body’s movement, like a puppet.

Repetition is the deliberate use of a word or phrase more than once in a sentence or a text. It is used to purposefully re-use of words and phrases for an effect. In Stanza 3, Line 1 and 5 the persona repeats the words could have to stress on that her lover had the opportunity to have her. She wants him to rescue her from her misery but he did not. Her lover was more interested in physical love rather that emotional love that the persona wants. So she rejects her lover and leaves him. In Stanza 4, Line 10 and 11 the poet repeats the line the loneliness beneath to signify the intensity of her loneliness in the relationship. The repetition emphasizes that she is deprived of real love – romantic love as all her lover is offering is physical love. Beneath refers to the feeling inside the persona where the physical love and actions can never hope to reach. The love relationship results in loneliness because of different attitudes towards love between man and woman.

The poet uses punctuations, such as the ellipsis and the dash, to emphasize the content or length of pause. Some of the lines are ended with dash which is used to indicate a break of thought and an unfinished dialogue. It also indicates an interruption the persona wants to draw attention to. Other punctuation marks—commas and parentheses—serve similar purposes. In Stanza 4, Line 3 your eyes could never burn- and followed by Line 4 it isn’t through. These two lines are not continued, even are spaced, but the idea is linked. The dash silences the poem for a second; it creates a more powerful fusion of thoughts. it may refer to the persona’s lover’s eyes, but it may also refer to the attitudes, enthusiasm and passion of her lover toward their relationship. Another example that can be found in Stanza 5, Line 1 touch is not all- and Line 2 feeling at home with it are not continued, but the idea is linked. The persona reiterates the physical actions are not the things she wants, she wants to be embraced by comfort, warmth, safety and security. And most importantly, the romance from her lover. Again, the different attitudes toward love between man and woman are emphasized.

Similarly, a pause can be used instead of a dash to indicate aposiopesis, an unfinished thought, or, at the end of a sentence, a trailing off into silence. When placed at the end of a sentence, the pause can also inspire a feeling of melancholy longing. The pause is sometimes used to represent an intentional silence, perhaps indicating irritation, dismay, shock or disgust. This rhetorical device where a sentence is stopped short, is not because of interruption, but is because of the speaker is too emotional to continue. She is sobbing. In Stanza 2, Line 2, there is a pause before the word apart to emphasize the distance between the persona and her lover. The word “distance” here is not the physical distance or space between two persons, but it implies the emotional distance or the different mindset of her and her lover toward love. In Stanza 3, the persona says her lover had the opportunity to have her. In Line 6 after the dash, the persona reveals the reasons she rejects her lover. Her lover wore his heart on a sleeve means that he expresses his emotions and desires directly. For her, that way of expressing love is not poetic and romantic.  In Stanza 5, Line 5 the pause before somehow implies that the persona is considering and thinking about the relationship. She stops sobbing. She sighs and says the word somehow by showing her depression and despair toward the relationship. The persona is reluctant to leave her lover, and now shows that she has accepted the fact that she and her lover express love differently. She wants to leave and let her lover go.

The poet uses line break in the whole poem. A line break in poetry is when the line of a poem ceases to extend, and a new line starts. Where the lines are broken in relation to the ideas in the poem also affects the feeling of reading the poetry. One type of line break is enjambment, which is the breaking of a syntactic unit (a phrase, clause, or sentence) by the end of a line or between two verses. It is sometimes referred to as a "run-on line". She is uncertain. She is sobbing. That’s the reasons each line in this poem is short with only a few words at a time and each idea is broken into lines. As the line progresses, the reader has to go on to the next sentence to understand the meaning of previous sentence. In Stanza 5, Line 3 I’ve grown numb and Line 4 to its call can form an end-stopped line actually. However, the poet wants to reinforce or contrast the ideas in the poem – the persona’s mind and feeling towards this relationship are numbed. She does not feel excited or look forward to have intimacy with her lover anymore. She has become unresponsive towards her lover, due to the different understanding of love.

            The central idea of this poem is the different attitudes and mindsets between man and woman toward love. The persona wants emotional love whereas her lover is more interested in physical love. From Stanza 3, Line 8 to 11 the persona’s lover doesn’t hide his emotions and desires. He demands for love from the persona. The persona couldn’t accept his way of love. After some time, she is still unable to feel the passion from her lover, even when they are in a state of intimacy. In Stanza 4 she says your eyes could never burn- / it isn't through / a lack of desire / to set up what is a fire / but where lips touch / and hands meet / can never hope to reach / the loneliness beneath / the loneliness beneath. It implies her loneliness in the relationship and she is deprived of real love. At last, she starts to feel disgusted with such perverse way of love.

What are the differences in attitudes and mindsets between man and woman toward love?  Women often feel unloved because their emotional needs aren’t being met, and in the same way, men often feel ignored because their physical needs aren’t being met. What women mean by intimacy is deep emotional connection, sharing and hearing the heart of the loved, the ability to cry easily and together at emotional moments, a sensitivity to know immediately when feelings are hurt, understanding each other’s dreams and goals, and closeness of the heart and soul. However, what men mean by intimacy is physical connection, foreplay, hand-holding, hugging and kissing, understanding each other’s physical needs, an ability to communicate physical needs, physical time alone together and a sensitivity to know when physical needs are present. These are the ways of love – the different ways of love between man and woman.

Read more: The poem Ways of Love