# Near the Cascades explained — Poetry

> Chapter companion for Poetry by Ameen Rihani.

## What happens

The speaker, lying near cascades, pleads for respite from a lover's intense kisses, reflecting on mortality, the soul's ascent, and the transient nature of love and beauty.

## Themes in this chapter

### Love and Loss

The speaker's intense, consuming love is intertwined with loss and the ephemeral nature of kisses and tears.

### Nature and Mortality

Imagery of cascades, hemlock tree, and grass underscores the speaker's meditation on death and the soul's journey.

## Character check-ins

### Unknown Narrator

The speaker who yearns for rest and reflects on love and mortality near the cascades.

### Beauty

Invoked as 'Beauty's daughter, Beauty's bride,' representing an idealized, transcendent force.

## Key lines

> Hold back thy lips, I pray; Just let me rest this way; My soul is in the spray Arising from the silvery cascades murmuring farewell to the day.

Please stop kissing me and let me rest; my spirit is caught in the mist of the cascades as they bid the day goodbye.

_The speaker asks for a pause, feeling his soul merge with the cascading water._

> If every kiss of thine Is safely kept with mine For one for whom I pine, Wouldst thou, contented with the taking, call my love a love divine?

If each of your kisses is stored with mine for the one I long for, would you be satisfied and deem my love holy?

_The speaker questions whether the lover would accept his devotion to another._

> Beneath this hemlock tree A clod I leave to thee; But over land and sea My soul is rising, rising, rising, searching for the gods that be.

I leave my earthly body like a clod under this tree, but my soul ascends across the world, seeking the gods.

_The speaker contrasts his mortal remains with his immortal soul's quest._

## Links

- HTML: https://www.betterreads.online/discover/poetry_2_se/chapters/near-the-cascades
- Book: https://www.betterreads.online/discover/poetry_2_se
- All chapters: https://www.betterreads.online/discover/poetry_2_se/chapters