Blizzard

In addition to its introspective voice and natural subject matter reflecting Romantic ideals, the poem’s formal elements mark its situation within the historical literary conversation. The poem is free verse, meaning that it has no regular metrical pattern or rhyme scheme—indeed, “Blizzard” initially appears entirely amorphous as one long, spontaneously undulating stanza. While free verse is most often associated with Modernism (and even a spirit of “counter-Romanticism”), it enjoyed a nascent celebration in Romantic poetry; the break from traditional structure afforded poets a new creative liberty that was instrumental in the movement’s individualism. Additionally, Romantic poets prized unrarefied subject matter—and, unbound by traditional linguistic constraints, they could more easily employ suitably colloquial diction, imitating organic (or, as the Romantics might think of it, authentic) speech patterns. As part of the Romantic heritage, this sense of natural diction pervades “Blizzard” and much other Confessional poetry.

In “Blizzard,” however, these elements do more than accommodate an individualist sensibility. The unstudied diction and uninhibited form underscore the predominantly whimsical tone: The speaker is lost in a reverie, her imagination roving freely between associations whose impetuousness finds further expression through the momentum of ubiquitous enjambment. These elements, coalesced with the prolonged single-stanza form, produce a cascading effect that resembles the blizzard itself; the poem, like the snow, is a continuous, animate, mutable flurry.