Disillusionment Of Ten O'clock
Disillusionment [1] of Ten O'Clock [2]
The houses are haunted [3]
By white night-gowns [4]. [5]
None are green,
Or purple with green rings,
Or green with yellow rings,
Or yellow with blue rings.
None of them are strange, [6]
With socks of lace [7]
And beaded [8]ceintures[9]. [10]
People are not going
To dream of baboons [11]and periwinkles [12]. [13]
Only, here and there, [14] an old sailor,
Drunk and asleep in his boots, [15]
Catches Tigers [16]
In red [17]weather.
FOOTNOTES
[1] To destroy or undermine an ideal, illusion, or mistaken belief that is held by
somebody.
[2] It is ten p.m. since the poem says 'night-gowns'.
[3] Visited by a ghost or other supposed supernatural being. But, here, it means
that the people are in white night-gowns.
[4] A loose dress of light material worn in bed by women and girls.
[5] This sentence may suggest that these people, who are in beds, are in pretty
dead atmosphere since they are asleep.
[6] The clothes are very simple, and they are not strange.
[7] A long thin rope that is used to tie two parts of a garment together.
[10] They are wearing ceintures or socks of lace.
[12] A European or Asian trailing evergreen plant with blue or white flowers and
dark green glossy leaves.
[13] The people are not thinking about baboons and periwinkles.
[14] It is as if the poet ignores the old sailor by saying 'only, here and there'.
[15] He is a poor sailor.
[16] The word tiger reminds us the William Blake's famous poem, 'Tyger', which
was a romantic poem. In this way, 'Tyger' as a romantic poem contrasts with this
modern poem.
[17] Red is a symbol of power.
ANALYSIS
'Disillusionment of ten o'clock' is the embodiment of the narrator's disillusionment which is not clear for the readers until two different pictures, women in white night-gowns and the old sailor, are depicted without any hint that which one of them is disillusioned.
The first picture is a dream-like picture since the readers are in the house in which the women have worn their night gowns, and they 'are not going to dream of baboons and periwinkles'. There is no movement or color in this picture which depicts how their life is. The corpse-like people do not know that they are doing wrong, so they cannot be disillusioned. The second picture is the actual picture of an old sailor who is drunk and asleep in the street that 'catches tigers', does something, 'in red weather'. The motionless and colorless picture, the first one, contrasts with the moving and colorful one, the second picture. There is not an indication that the sailor is disillusioned, either. In this way, the narrator who observes these two pictures is disillusioned since he can see what the modern life is; it is whether to be like a corpse or the sailor.
The poet makes the readers confused by the title that he has chosen, it is the title that suggests the 'disillusionment', since they are eager to understand which one of the people are disillusioned, but, finally, catches none of them are disillusioned but he himself as a reader who perceives the two mentioned ways of modern life, to be like a corpse or a sailor, since the poet dose not talk about, directly or indirectly, that one of the people mentioned before know that they are doing wrong.
Maryam Javaherinia