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Wild Grapes

The old orchard, full of smoking air,

Full of sour marsh and broken boughs, is there,

But kept no more by vanished Mulligans,

Or Hartigans, long drowned in earth themselves,

Who gave this bitter fruit their care.

Here's where the cherries grew that birds forgot,

And apples bright as dogstars; now there is not

An apple or a cherry; only grapes,

But wild ones, Isabella grapes they're called,

Small, pointed, black, like boughs of musket-shot.

Eating their flesh, half-savage with black fur.

Acid and gipsy-sweet, I thought of her,

Isabella, the dead girl, who has lingered on

Defiantly when all have gone away,

In an old orchard where swallows never stir.

Isabella grapes, outlaws of a strange bough,

That in their harsh sweetness remind me somehow

Of dark hair swinging and silver pins,

A girl half-fierce, half-melting, as these grapes,

Kissed here –- or killed here –- but who remembers now?

Wild Grapes

“Wild Grapes” embodies a tone of decrepit abandonment, evoking images of overgrowing unkempt vines sprawling and reaching out through a now unattended orchard. While it visually conveys the image of despondence, it articulates the idea of passing time; creating a haunting memory of lost potential and the unsettling human experience of lingering regret.

We are immediately confronted with a setting that is not supposed to be pleasant. The orchard is old and “full of smoking air.” Here Slessor creates a visceral taste of bitterness; a hazy obscurity that metaphorically and physically settles upon the orchard. The “sour marsh” and “broken boughs” adds to decrepit surroundings now infertile and unsuited for growing fruit. Slessor transports us into the wet, murky undergrowth in order to accentuate a lack of hope – the grounds are unsalvageable having already fallen into obscurity. He points towards the idea that the orchard was once well tended to and pruned by families long gone. These families themselves have been buried deep down under the swampy marsh – “drowned,” evoking a feeling of suffocation that has replaced the flourishing sense of life that had once characterised the orchard. The fruit is bitter, it is both literally and figuratively hard to swallow; symbolic of the inherent human experience of regret and despair. However, the gentle rhyme of air/ there/ care lends a musicality to the first stanza and softens the harshness of the content.

The first two lines in Stanza Two brings us into the past where the orchard once held bourgeoning life of cherries and apples, full of hope and promise – bright and almost incandescent. Time has passed as now, not a single apple or a cherry remains. The semi colon pushes us into the present, the use of terse literal language is blunt and abrupt, shaking us out of the pleasant imagery established in the first two lines of the stanza. The wild Isabella grapes are characterised as almost deadly, like small bullets, black and pointed.

The imagery turns darker, untamed and cannibalistic – the grapes are described with animalistic characteristics; furry and rather threatening. They burst with acid and the shock of the taste almost stings but is however, compounded by its gipsy-sweetness. The poet is referring to the girl too, the memory of Isabella herself lingers and lurks alongside the Isabella grapes. Her memory leaves the same aftertaste as the fruit, it remains “defiantly” while she is dead. The word “defiant” gives a sense of determination and tenacity. The grapes also remain long after people have moved on and gone away – nature continues to dominate. Here we are left with an image of emptiness with the orchard being a place that even swallows have abandoned. This articulates an unsettling stillness and an all too unnatural quietness. Swallows, migratory birds which ordinarily return to their nests annually and mate for life do not “stir” in the old orchard. The stagnancy of the orchard is unnerving and almost nightmarish, reinforcing the potent human experience of hopelessness and dread.

The grapes are described as being misplaced, like the girl herself, existing in the peripheral of society; shunned and outlawed. There is a paradox in the “harsh sweetness” of the grapes, accentuating a gentleness that is simultaneously grating.The synecdoche of “dark hair swinging and silver pins” gives an abstract depiction of the girl. It provides a snatch and glimpse of her that is incomplete and perhaps not very accurate. Thus, an ambiguity characterises the poem, lending it a sort of murkiness and ambivalence. The girl is “half-fierce, half-melting” her image strengthening, becoming vivid and also receding; slinking away. The poet questions her fate – whether she was kissed or killed there, he does not know. Either way, such an image is charged with passion but is completely contradictory – “kiss” connotes affection and love while “kill” suggests sinister intent. Here memory is questioned – how could something so different become so blurred; almost melting into the same thing? Here lies the inconsistency of human experience, the uncertainty that surroundings us and the unreliability of truth.

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