Applewhite's Tone

First of all, let's revist the definition of "tone"--the emotional stance of the speaker of the poem toward a particular speaker or object. The tone of many of Applewhite's poems is introspective, reflective, and considerate of the past. Much of the imagery relates to the passage of time, with the seasons representing different stages in life and a discussion of how past inhabitants of a place affect the current residents. Applewhite longs for the past, and the underlying focus on events that have already occurred creates a meloncholy tone.

For example:

"Jamestown"

All looks little and low--like the creek
bank at home, when we'd have come from
the canoe. But here and more alone than I can
dream, they awaited the return

of the Godspeed, though the water most would corss
was Pitch and Tar Swamp, bearing rushes
to thatch houses, for a town that in two years' time
look like an ancient ruin.

...

So England orphaned us in a new ruin representing
the old one, that we thought with envy of until
those kinsmen fed into the soil made the tilling of it
identity, and this bereft place home.

Gentlemen of the Company, could you not plant other
knowledge to guide us in our new isolation--
palisaded on a shore, watching for the returning ships, more
lost than Raleigh's first colony?

The events described in the poem are grounded in the past, but Applewhite ties the poem into the present with the first stanza. Applewhite turns the subject of the poem from the speaker (I) to the settlers of early America (they): "But here and more alone than I can dream, they awaited the return." By using both of the pronouns in the same sentence (and so close together), he creates a syntaxical link between the past and present. In the next to the last stanza, Applewhite brings the reader back in time with his pronoun usage another time: "So England orphaned us...that we thought." The stanza describes a search for identity within the colonies, but the use of the pronouns allows the reader to easily extend this search to become his or her own. By italicizing home, Applewhite adds to the reflective, identity-searching tone that the reader has come to expect in other Applewhite poems. The author looks for solutions to current identity issues in the past, but lets the reader draw many of the connections between descriptions of history and goals for the future. I think that many other poems that are deeply rooted in the history have a much more didactic tone; Applewhite chooses instead to describe the events in a mellow, contemplative tone.