I need an analysis of Robert Lowell 's poem "Where the Rainbow Ends."

Hi there!

I love analyzing
poems, so thank you for giving me the chance to help
you!

We can learn a lot about a poem by looking at the
title: "Where the Rainbow Ends."  What does this mean?  The rainbow is a great (if
overused) symbol representing "better times ahead" in that it is a promise that God will
not destroy the world again by flood.  The colors of a rainbow are glorious, and
according to myth at the end of the rainbow we are supposed to find a pot of gold.  The
idea of the rainbow is usually a positive one.

On the other
hand, a person can never actually FIND the end of a rainbow, so it can be a symbol of
futility and frustration.  Where does that leave us?  We can guess that the poem is
going to either have a theme of promise and hope, or one of
futility.

readability="6">

"I saw the sky descending, black and
white

Not blue, on Boston..."

When the sky
descends it usually means a storm is coming.  Boston appears to be the
setting.

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...where the winters
wore

The skulls to jack-o-lanterns on
the slates,

A rite
of fall is Halloween (hence the pumpkin carving.)  These jack-o-lanterns seem to have
been left out on the "slates" (porches?) too long and are now husks embraced by the
winter storm.

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"And hunger's skin and bones retrievers
tore

The chickadee and shrike."

Both are birds
found in Boston, and both migrate South during extreme cold weather.  This storm has
caught these birds who would rather have migrated to warmer climate.  Perhaps the storm
came early in the year...that would also explain the pumpkins being left
out.

"...The thorn
tree waits

its victim, and
tonight

The tree
with thorns seems to imply it has no leaves, or no fruit to offer as food for the birds.
 Instead of a symbol of life, it is bad news for the
birds.

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The worms will eat the deadwood to the
foot

Of Ararat: the scythers, Time and
Death

Helmed locusts, move upon the
tree of
breath;"

Mount
Ararat is purported to be the mountain on which Noah's ark came to rest.  That ties in
with the rainbow in the title.  Time and Death are seen here as negative forces, locusts
that consume all in their path.

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"...the wild ingrated with
the olive and the root

Are
withered, and a winter drifts to
where

The Pepperpot, ironic rainbow,
spans

Charles river and its scale of
scorched earth
miles..."

The
winter seems to be smothering the trees and plants.  A "pepperpot" can be a small
lighthouse, which seems to be casting a light across the barren Charles
River.

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"I saw my city in the scales, the
pans

of judgment rising and
descending."

The
scales of justice, weighing good and bad, against
Boston.

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Piles of dead leaves char the
air -- and I am a red arrow on this
graph

of revelations.

I'm not so sure
here...the dead leaves are a part of fall/winter.  He seems to think of himself as the
pointer on the scale of justice.

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Every dove is
sold.

The chapels sharp-shinned eagle
shifts its hold

On serpent time, the
rainbows epitaph.

The dove is a
peace bird, and the bird that Noah let out from the ark.  Compare that with the powerful
eagle.  Boston is being judged harshly.

I don't have the
space left to quote the last stanza, so you'll have to look it up.  It seems to be
saying that while the city of Boston has been judged harshly in a biblical apocalypse,
the narrator is able to transcend those things and remain a force that praises God and
operates for "good."   Jesus has helped the narrator to rise above the harshness of
Boston.

I hope these ideas help
you!