Crossing the Bar by Alfred, Lord Tennyson

Crossing the Bar by Alfred, Lord Tennyson

Just as the rest of the literary works due in this unit, this poem by Lord Tennyson covers death. However, it more specifically highlights the actual process of dying through the metaphor of a sailor crossing the bar. In the first stanza, when he writes "may there be no moaning of the bar when i put out to sea", literally, that references how the wind moans against the sand bar out at sea, but metaphorically he refers to the actually moaning by his loved ones over his passing (Tennyson 886). The act of the narrator crossing the bar seems to reference the idea of going off into the great unknown, into the open expanse of death. I do question whether or not this poem has a religious aspect or not. I am confused when he writes of his hope to see his Pilot face to face. It seems inevitable for this Pilot to represent God for thats who one usually thinks of meeting upon their death. However, the rest of the poem does not reference religion nor any other notion of a higher power, just the metaphor of his own death.

Each stanza covers an aspect of the departing of the vessel. The first stanza gives the image of the end to a day and the author writing of when he is put out to sea. The second stanza describes the vessel that is to take him away heading towards the shore. The third is him entering the ship and setting off. The fourth and final paragraph is the final leaving of the author as he crosses the bar to enter the "boundless deep" (Tennyson 886)