Symbol Analysis
Why explain what's actually around you when you can write a perfectly good poem describing what's not there? Maybe Heaney, being the master of description that he is, wanted to challenge himself with this one. Who knows what his motivations were, but the result is a poem whose description relies a whole lot on what doesn't exist. While that might seem a little weird, it creates a feeling of loneliness and isolation, which is exactly what we should feel in a poem about waiting out a crazy storm on an island with no one—and no thing—around for help.
- Lines 3-7: There's no hay. There's no crop of any kind, for that matter. And, oh yeah, there aren't even trees. This isn't exactly a lush landscape with all types of beautiful vegetation to look at from your window. The island, at least this part of it, seems pretty barren. It might feel, for the residents at least, that it's just them and the wind, and there's nothing else there to keep them company or protect them.
- Lines 11-14: Again, Heaney mentions that there are no trees. This is only a 19-line poem, gang, so the fact that he repeats "there are no trees" means that it's a big deal. If there were trees, maybe they could break up the wind a little and lessen its impact on the houses. The speaker drifts to thinking about the sea and how it might be good company—a nice, peaceful plane of water to look at—but no, it's an exploding, roiling beast of a thing that you'd probably want to steer clear of at all costs.