First Death in Nova Scotia

The poem is a lyric: It is relatively short and centers on the speaker’s personal experience, their memory of Arthur’s death. The poem links to Bishop’s biography and qualifies as a confessional poem. Though Bishop isn’t confessing a secret, she is confiding about a personal memory. The poem works as a riddle, as the speaker’s unfamiliarity with death produces an eerie atmosphere that makes it difficult to decipher. Defamiliarization makes the poem a puzzle, and the reader must piece it together.

While the poem is confessional, Bishop didn’t identify as a confessional poet, and the reader doesn’t need to link the speaker to the poet to understand the poem. Based on a close reading of the poem, the speaker has neither a name nor a gender. Based on the title, the speaker’s memory occurs in Nova Scotia, where, presumably, their late cousin lived with his father, Uncle Arthur. The speaker also has a mother who “laid out Arthur” (Line 2) and has a commanding role in the funeral—choosing where to display Arthur. Aside from technical details, the speaker remains mysterious. They don’t share their intangible feelings about Arthur. Instead, they act as a photographer, sharing images of what they see and letting the audience discern the applicable emotions.

The speaker establishes the poem’s unfeeling atmosphere when they note “the cold, cold parlor” (Line 1). The setting isn’t warm and emotive but icy; the repetition of “cold” reinforces this. The presence of British royalty advances the poem’s formal tone, suggesting a firm hierarchy. The pictures of the Prince of Wales, Princess Alexandra, and “King George with Queen Mary” (Line 6) draw attention to their power over the speaker and their family. The British royals also add to the poem’s alienated tone. The royals aren’t physically in Nova Scotia, so the dynamic indicates displacement. The alienation and displacement buttress the poem’s objective tone. The speaker’s voice isn’t subjective but impartial. They dispassionately describe Arthur’s death and use technical diction like “chromatographs” (Line 3), emphasizing the speaker’s stoicism.

The speaker’s vagueness creates confusion. Concerning the “stuffed loon / shot and stuffed” (Lines 8-9) by Uncle Arthur, the speaker explains, “Since Uncle Arthur fired a bullet into him, / he hadn’t said a word” (Lines 11-13). The “he” is not immediately clear: Has Uncle Arthur not spoken since killing the loon, or has the bird remained quiet since Uncle Arthur shot them? The following lines suggest that the “he” is the loon. The poem uses anthropomorphism, giving the loon human traits. The loon becomes a “he,” and he keeps “his own counsel” (Line 14). Removed from the others, the bird advances the detached tone. Displacement continues as the speaker turns the “marble-topped table” (Line 16) into a “white, frozen lake” (Line 15). The use of “frozen” (Line 15) and “cold” (Line 18) links back to the unfeeling tone, while “white” (Line 15) signifies purity. The idiom “much to be desired” (Line 20) connects austerity and purity. The bird is dead. It has no desires; thus, it’s not vulnerable to corruption.

The speaker’s mother propels the poem. She commands, “Come and say good-bye / to your little cousin Arthur” (Lines 22-23). The speaker explains, “I was lifted up” (Line 24). This line reveals the speaker’s lack of agency. They can vividly think about the scene, but they need someone to physically move them. The use of passive voice contributes to the poem’s vagueness. It’s not clear who lifted them. Presumably, it’s the mother, but the mother isn’t the only adult in the room. There’s Uncle Arthur, and there are likely other adults nearby who could have lifted the speaker and given them the “lily of the valley” (Line 26) to put in Arthur’s hand.

The poem continues to use defamiliarization and anthropomorphism, with the speaker turning Arthur’s coffin into a “little frosted cake” (Line 28). The speaker creates conflict by imagining the loon wanting to eat the cake. Whiteness blurs the boundaries between Arthur and the bird. The bird’s “breast [i]s deep and white” (Line 17), and Arthur is “all white, like a doll” (Line 32). Jack Frost is a symbol of wintery weather, as is the loon, which resides on a frozen lake.

The speaker anthropomorphizes Jack Frost; the symbol becomes a person. As a person, Frost has a profession: He’s a mortuary cosmetologist or someone who puts makeup on dead people. The speaker says, “Jack Frost had started to paint him” (Line 33). Frost doesn’t finish his job. He gives Arthur “a few red strokes” (Line 38) before he abandons his paintbrush and leaves Arthur “white, forever” (Line 40). Like the loon, Arthur is lifeless, frozen, and pure.

The speaker, when mentioning “the Maple Leaf (Forever)” (Line 36), alludes to Canada’s distinct national identity. The maple leaf is Canada’s national symbol, and in 1867, the Canadian teacher, soldier, and creative Alexander Muir composed the patriotic song “The Maple Leaf Forever.” The use of “Forever” in Line 36 also links to Arthur, who is “forever” (Line 40) gone. The relationship between Arthur and national identities persists when the speaker imagines the “gracious royal couples” (Line 41) inviting Arthur to visit them “at court” (Line 46). The speaker creates a harsh image of Arthur “clutching his tiny lily” (Line 48), eyes “shut up so tight” (Line 49) and trying to navigate “the road deep in snow” (Line 50). The speaker wonders, “[H]ow could Arthur go[?]” (Line 47). From one angle, the question is rhetorical. The speaker realizes that Arthur is dead, so he can’t get up and go to the royals. In an alternative interpretation, the question isn’t rhetorical. The speaker’s puzzling, detached tone suggests that Arthur can somehow brave the wintery weather and join the British royals at court, transcending death.