Love after love

Throughout his lengthy and accomplished career as a poet, Derek Walcott achieved several accomplishments, including winning the 1992 Nobel Prize for Literature. Although the Homeric epic Omeros is his most well-regarded poetry, Love After Love is arguably his most well-known. The poem deviates from the norm for a love poem by emphasizing self-love. It specifically talks about how crucial it is to love oneself after a relationship ends. Its central premise is the idea of regaining one's wholeness via self-awareness. Love After Love is a four-stanza poem written in the manner of advice given to someone who is distressed because of a poor relationship. The speaker thinks this person has changed into someone else and, only when he fully embraces his true self, will he be able to become fully content.

The four-stanza poem Love After Love by Derek Walcott is written in the guise of a person giving advice to a distraught individual. Readers can deduce from those four stanzas that the individual receiving this advice is still reeling from the misery of the experience, and that the distress stems from a terrible relationship that has ended or should end. In any case, Walcott informs this person—this "you"—that as a result of this relationship, not only will things become better, but also the entire status of things will improve. The main focus of the poem appears to be the cause of this, as the speaker repeatedly states, that who this person has become does not accurately represent who they truly are, but one day, their true self will return. On that day, they will be happy again since only in embracing who they are can they fully be content.

Poet: Derek Walcott

Published: 1976