Sunday, June 17, 2018

Around what task does this poem center?

"Huswifery" by Edward Taylor doesn't center around a single task (unless you count doing "housewife" work a single task).  The poem is divided into three stanzas, and each stanza is focused on a different task.  In the first stanza, the narrator asks God to make him into a spinning wheel.  The purpose of a spinning wheel is to spin (make) thread from natural fibers.  In the second stanza, the narrator asks God to make him into a "loome."  The purpose of a loom is to take thread and weave it together in order to make complete cloth/fabric.  Fabric can then be used to make clothing, which is what the final stanza is about.  The narrator wants God to then clothe him with many different God honoring virtues:

Then cloath therewith mine Understanding, Will, 
Affections, Judgment, Conscience, Memory. 

The narrator wants to be used in this way so that all that he produces may eventually reflect and glorify God:


My Words, and Actions, that their shine may fill 
My wayes with glory and thee glorify. 

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