Symbols, Imagery, Wordplay
Welcome to the land of symbols, imagery, and wordplay. Before you travel any further, please know that there may be some thorny academic terminology ahead. Never fear, Shmoop is here. Check out our...
Form and Meter
The poem is a variation on the Japanese form of the haiku, a very short poem divided into three sections with a certain number of syllables in each section. In English, haikus are often written as...
Speaker
Our speaker likes to tell ghost stories. He's sitting around a campfire with a flashlight on his face, finishing his latest tale of horror: "And, worst of all, the faces of the ghosts weren't even...
Setting
The poem appears to be set in some kind of wooded subway in the springtime where there might be ghosts. Weird. The title locates the poem within the metro station, underground. Then, in the first l...
Sound Check
We think this poem sounds like a tennis match. Now bear with us here. The poem consists of two lines that bring together the image of faces in the metro with the image of petals on the branch. It&#...
What's Up With the Title?
Considering that the title is half as long as the entire poem, we might as well put it under the microscope, as if it were part of the poem. The "metro" is short for the French word for "metropolit...
Calling Card
Asian influence. Pound studied Japanese poetry and theater and translated many Chinese poems, especially those of Li Po, whom he loved. Pound’s translations were often loose and experimental....
Tough-O-Meter
Once you get that it’s a metaphor, the hardest part of the poem is trying to pronounce the word "bough." Plus, it’s so short!
Brain Snacks
Sex Rating
"G." You could probably think of some kind of provocative meanings for some of the images if you wanted to, but we think this is pretty much a G-rated flick.