Seamus Heaney’s Representation of The Growth Process of Blackberries as Depicted in Blackberry-picking

It is often said that the blacker the berry is, the sweeter its juice will be. Such is evident in Seamus Heaney’s “Blackberry-Picking.” Throughout the poem, Heaney uses the symbolism of the ripening and rotting of blackberries to represent youth and death respectively. Heaney takes the seemingly innocent task of going blackberry picking in the summer and creates these complex metaphors with the physical intensity of his language. Heaney uses the symbolism of the blackberries and diction that alters from mellifluous to rancid to prove the physical intensity of the language and how everything and everyone eventually decays as we all meet our demise.

Heaney uses the symbolism of blackberries to represent the narrator’s realization that youth ends quickly. In the first stanza of the poem, the narrator is hugely excited over the prospect of picking fresh, ripe blackberries. The narrator says, “You ate that first one and its flesh was sweet like thickened wine.” The sweetness of the newly ripened blackberries is a symbol for the narrator’s youth, lust and hope in the world. But these feelings that the narrator has quickly fade as the blackberry juice begins to rot. The narrator says, “The sweet flesh would turn sour.” This is significant because the narrator comes to the realization that everything eventually dies and this causes him to lose his sense of hope in the world. Death is an inevitable part of life and it is difficult for young people to grasp this idea. Heaney uses the symbolization of the blackberries to prove these ideas of life and death.

Heaney uses varying styles of diction in each stanza to emphasize his feelings about life and death. The first stanza of the poem is filled with very euphoric diction because of the narrator’s excitement over picking the fresh blackberries. He uses words like “glossy” and “tinkling” to describe the lush blackberries while they are young and ripe. Heaney also uses warm and lively colors throughout the first stanza to prove this. The color green is the most significant in this case because green is often used to symbolize life and growth. The ripe blackberries are in their prime, as is the narrator when he is picking them. However, the second stanza changes completely. Heaney uses words like “glutting” and “stinking” to prove his sense of disapproval over the rotting of his precious pickings. He also uses colors like “rat-grey” to show how disgusting and awful that the rotting of this fruit is. The narrator is horrified and ultimately saddened by his realization that everything eventually dies and decays. The varying styles of diction that Heaney uses throughout the poem show the narrator’s changing emotions over the life and death of the blackberries.

Throughout the poem Heaney uses varying diction and symbolism of blackberries to prove the physical intensity of the language and how everything and everyone eventually dies and decays. Heaney uses blackberries specifically because of their sweet juice that is matched by no other berry. It is especially devastating to the narrator when its juice rots because it teaches the narrator the inevitable truth that nothing can stay young forever.