2.  The poem is about the death of Abse’s
aunt Alice. He describes her to be quite
dramatic and she seems to be a realist.
 ‘your bible Page One of a newspaper’
 He makes out that she was the aunt
that wasn’t appreciated by many as he
refers to her not having an ‘opera-
ending’.
 She is someone who talks about
everyday life being a path to death
instead of sugar-coating the truth.
 ‘you talked of typhoid when we sat to
eat’
 She looked for excitement and made
boring things interesting.
 She lived for a wild life rather than a
mundane lifestyle.
 ‘your friends also grew SPECTACULAR,
none to bore you by dying naturally’
 This poem is a way for Abse to talk of
death and the many paths around it
without making it seem like a negative
event.

3.  There is no rhyme in the poem
which could show that life is
something that you cant foresee or
mould into what you want. It also
shows that everyone's life is
different and it is not always the
same.
 The structure is quite ‘scruffy’ and
there is no strict order which can
show that not everyone can follow
the same path in life.
 The narrator tells the poem as a
story as the first line reads ‘Aunt
Alice’s funeral was orderly,’
showing that he was there and is
now reminiscing to someone who
seems not to have known Aunt
Alice.

4.  It can be interpreted that everyday
life can cause destruction showing
that this poem holds an element of
truth.
 It could be taken that Aunt Alice
didn’t have anyone to love but this
didn’t make her have a lonely life,
as she still lived an exciting and
different lifestyle.
 It could show that Abse would like
to live more like her and do
something thrilling with his life.
 ‘Such disguises and such
transformations’
 ‘Disasters that lit your eyes’

5.  Dockery and Son – Larkin wish he
had done more with his life instead
of sitting around and waiting for it
to start.
 Ambulances – Larkin talks of death
always being around in everyday
life.
 Mr Bleaney – Larkin tells a story of
someone and remembers them
through the poem.

6. Aunt Alice's funeral was orderly,
each mourner correct, dressed in decent black,
not one balding relative beserk with an axe.
PoorAlice, where's your opera-ending?
For alive you relished high catastrophe,
your bible Page One of a newspaper.
You talked of typhoid when we sat to eat;
Fords on the M4, mangled, upside down,
just when we were going for a spin;
and, at London airport, as you waved us off,
how you fatigued us with 'metal fatigue' ,
vague shapes of Boeings bubbling under seas.
Such disguises and such transformations!
Even trees were but factories for coffins,
rose bushes decoys to rip boys' eyes with thorns.
Sparrows became vampires, spiders had designs,
and your friends also grew SPECTACULAR,
none to bore you by dying naturally.
A. had both kidneys removed in error
at Guy's. 'And such a clever surgeon too.'
B., one night, fell screaming down a liftshaft.
'Poor fellow, he never had a head for heights.'
C., so witty, so feminine, 'Pitty
she ended up in a concrete-mixer.
But now, never again, Alice, will you utter
gory admonitions as some do oaths.
Disasters that lit your eyes will no more
unless, trembling up there, pale saints listen
to details of their bloody matrydoms,
all their tall stories, your eternity.