Language

• • "cottage-maiden" provides a sense of youth +vitality
  • "find me out" pedophillic connotations


  "I was a cottage-maiden" "Why did a great lord find me out"
• • "lured" predatorial verb
  • "palace-home" provides a false sense of security 


  "He lured me to his palace-home "
• • "shameless shameful" juxtaposition linking to their double-edged love
  • "plaything....love" juxtaposition and highlighting the objectification of women

  "a shameless shameful life, his plaything and his love"
• • "changed me" objectification of women
  • "moan" repeated sense of sexual presence
  • "unclean" links to her losing her virginity

  "changed me like a glove...moan an unclean thing"
• • "outcast" emphasizes that women are defined by status
  • "howl in dust" vivid metaphorical description + "dust" connotes an unused object collecting dust


  "outcast thing... I sit and howl in dust"
• • "fair-headed" links to his "flaxen" hair
  • "shame" as born out of wedlock but "pride" as she produced son while Kate couldn't

  "My fair-headed son, my shame, my pride"