Poem: Remember

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Note from Joe: This is always presented as a love poem. That just proves how poorly most people read poetry. This is a hate poem! Lines 3-8 send a chill down my spine, describing a dominating husband; lines 9-10 bespeak a heartless husband; and lines 11-12 make it clear that if thoughts could kill, she’d kill him. Love poem, my foot!

Note added later: Not everybody agrees with me, to put it mildly. See the note after the poem for an email that I just received...

Remember

by Christina Rossetti

Remember me when I am gone away,
Gone far away into the silent land;
When you can no more hold me by the hand,
Nor I half turn to go, yet turning stay.
Remember me when no more day by day
You tell me of our future that you planned:
Only remember me; you understand
It will be late to counsel then or pray.
Yet if you should forget me for a while
And afterwards remember, do not grieve:
For if the darkness and corruption leave
A vestige of the thoughts that once I had,
Better by far you should forget and smile
Than that you should remember and be sad.

Note from Joe: The following unsigned email reaction to my note above was received on 21 May 2007:
Dear Mr Joseph Horn,
Your views on Christina Rossetti's poem ' Remember me' is not only idiotic but shows that you are obviously a bitter and sad little man.
I really suggest that you should re-read this poem about LOVE as you seem to have everything mixed up. Either you havent the slightest idea about love or you are just stupid.
What you say the poem really means is ridiculous. The poem is not meant to be so cryptic, it's supposed to be instructions left behind. Why would you make them so complicated?
Good bye
Unfortunately, my critic fails to explain the lines that I cited above. If it's a love poem, why does Rossetti point out that she wanted to turn away from him but was prevented from doing so (line 4)? Or that she had no say in making the plans for their lives together (line 6)? Or that he would be unable to tell her what to do after she was dead (line 8)? And most telling of all, why should the remembrance of "the thoughts that I once had" cause him grief, if those thoughts were kind (line 12)? It seems clear to me that this is a poem about a battered wife, whose only hope for peace was the prospect of death. But if you wish to interpret it as a heart-warming love poem, hey, more power to ya. Nor will I accuse you of being bitter, sad, little, ignorant about love, or stupid, merely because you disagree with me. No reasonable person would do that. -jkh-
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