stanza 3

• "Only tonight"

  • Word order: places emphasis on how this experience of leaving home and travelling to a new location is a once in a lifetime transition, i.e. Growing up. 
• "happy and sad"

  • Paradox: contradictory feelings of excitement at what is to come and the sadness at what she is leaving behind. Simple words but these have depths of meaning.
  • Clear tension between freedom and the tug of nostalgia is felt by the speaker.
• "like a child

  who stood at the end of summer"

  • Simile: the speaker compares herself to a child at the end of summer; this extended imagery helps convey the confused feelings and the process of growing up.
  • Summer is the season for fun and games, i.e. Childhood. The natural progression of the seasons into Autumn reflects the inevitable: that we all grow up. 
• "and dipped a net

  in a green, erotic pond."

  • Word choice: the child within the simile is happy because there are tentative moves towards adulthood, ‘dipped’ and ‘erotic’ suggest a world beyond summer.
  • ‘erotic’ connotes the adult world and a potential sexual awakening. 
• "and dipped a net

  in a green, erotic pond."

  • The transferred epithet highlights the contradiction here: “green” suggests immaturity and naivety, whereas “erotic” conjures a more adult theme.  
  • The word choice ‘green’ also suggests that the pond has stagnated and has turned green/full of algae, thus marking the end of the fun games of summer, reflecting that the speaker’s childhood has also stagnated and is at its end. 
• "The day

  and ever. The day and ever."

  • Again, punctuated by the rhythm of childhood which is ever present on the journey to adulthood, suggests that the speaker will carry these speech patterns forward. 
• "I am homesick, free, in love

  with the way my mother speaks."

  • List – contradiction of positive and negative.  In this introspective line, the speaker unites previous contradictions. She is “homesick” for her childhood, her past and her mother. However, simultaneously she feels “free” to head down to England and establish a new life for herself.
• "I am homesick, free, in love

  with the way my mother speaks."

  • Enjambment emphasises “love”: is the speaker heading down to England for love? We realise, though, that she will always have a genuine love for the mother of her childhood with the final line/link to the title.