When I Was One and Twenty

¶ … twenty by A.E. Housman (1859-1936). From a Shropshire Lad. 1896.

The title of poem "When I was one and twenty" by, A.E. Housman, immediately indicates to the reader that the author no longer is "one and twenty," because the first word of the poem "when," dates this age in the past rather than in the present. Also, although the poem ends with a reference to the poet being "twenty-two," and thus still hardly of an old age, the irony of one year giving the individual a sense of weight and experience in matters of the heart seems less than genuine, suggesting that Housman is actually much older than his twenties, and is viewing the entire decade of his twenties as one where sensations and emotions, rather than logic or experience rule his human, adolescent heart.

Also, by paring the poet with a wise man, versus the poet as a young youth who will not listen, the reader gains a sense that the poet is now much older, in comparison to the relatively callow age of twenty-one or twenty-two. But there is a sense that the speaker has learned some lessons of life over the course of the poem or the year between twenty-one and twenty-two. The relatively light-hearted tone of the first stanza is reinforced by the rollicking tone of the second stanza's rhyme scheme, which is ababa, then ccaa. The last, longer stanza, however, is less connected in terms of its rhyme, which conveys the greater understanding and the greater rue the author feels, now that his experience is more extensive and worldly. The rhymes are less sharply paired, and also the syllables have a longer texture and feel to them, because the choice of words has longer internal vowel sounds, and because the beginnings of the lines are connected by repeating the word "And," rather than by a strong end rhyme scheme. The poem still has the tonal quality of a parable, a young man who thinks he is wise ignores advice, learns from his experience and now thinks, foolishly, he knows what living is all about at the age of twenty-two because he has been unlucky in love. But even the end stanza's connection to the first, with the rhymed repetition of "a" in the form of twenty, the last word of the first stanza shows the circularity of the lesson -- something has been learned, but not much, and the speaker is sure to give his heart away yet again -- so says the poet with the weight of experience.