Sestina

The poem 'Sestina', I think, encompasses many elements of a family that was once whole, as well as different conceptions of time. I took away that the grandmother and child are the only two remaining of this family. The father and mother of the child are absent, and it is not clear where they went, but it has left the grandmother and child with the company of kitchen appliances and an almanac. What I also saw was that the grandmother knows she is nearing death, and I think the almanac tells her this, as well as the Marvel Stove. But even in the first stanza it is obvious that she is close to death.

"September rain falls on the house.
In the failing light..."

"She thinks that her equinoctial tears..."

These two quotations are evidence that the grandmother is dying because September rain means that it is nearing the end of the year, thus the end of her life. The failing light also represents this, and also implies that the failing light is happening faster than usual (as realized by the grandmothers mentioning that it is time for tea), faster because winter is soon upon them.

The adjective equinoctial also represents the grandmother's death drawing closer. Equinoctial means (as found and directly quoted from the OED) "Happening at or near to the time of the equinox; said esp. of the ‘gales’ prevailing about the time of the autumnal equinox." The equinox is the turning point of the year, but it also represents the end of one period of time and the beginning of another. This is the end of the boy having his grandmother, and the beginning of him living alone. I wonder if the other equinox, the one of summer, was when the parents left the child to the grandmother.

There are many meanings to what the repetitious tears are, but I think one of them is that the grandmother is mourning that the boy will soon be alone as well as "the teakettle's small hard tears", which are mourning the loss of life in this house. I mean to say that the father and mother, who have left, have taken away life from the house, and now when the grandmother dies, there is more loss of life.