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The poem is an example of free verse. As the term implies, Ondaatje is free to make his lines any length he wants, and he doesn’t have to rhyme. The free verse leads to a rather messy-looking poem. The stanza lengths vary: Stanza 1 is four lines, Stanzas 2 and 3 consist of seven lives, Stanza 4 ups the ante and has eight lines, Stanza 5 has five lines, Stanza 6 has six four lines, Stanza 7 holds a single line, and Stanzas 8 and 9 contain five lines. The wavering stanza lengths link to the unstable line lengths. Some lines are short and feature only three or four syllables, while others jut out into the white space as they approach 10 syllables.
The open form and meter reflect the content of the poem. In other words, the free, untidy look of the poem illustrates the tenacity of the speaker’s desire. His desire for the woman routinely defies restriction and control, and so does the poem’s form. Like the cinnamon scent, the lines flow without much restraint.
The poem arguably turns on the “and knew” (Line 36), and Ondaatje reinforces the importance of the woman’s epiphany by making it a separate stanza. The woman’s realization stands alone. Stanza 7 is a bridge between the two parts of the poem. In the first part (Stanzas 1-6), the speaker has to be careful about getting his scent on the woman, but in the second part (Stanzas 8-9), after the woman discovers she wants the man’s desire, their bodies can touch, and they become husband and wife. Via the conspicuous one-line stanza, Ondaatje signals the dramatic shift.
Diction is a literary device with which the poet selects specific words to convey the poem's tone and critical themes and ideas. The first word of the poem is “[i]f,” and the third word is “were” (Line 1), so the diction immediately tells the reader that the poem largely consists of hypotheticals. The speaker imagines himself as a cinnamon peeler because he is not a cinnamon peeler. The subjunctive tone continues with “would reek” (Line 5), and the subjunctive mixes with the conditional—something that could happen, as opposed to something that has or hasn’t happened—when the speaker tells the woman, “You could never walk through the markets” (Line 6).
Even the wording of the similes (“as if not spoken to in the act of love / as if wounded without the pleasure of a scar” [Lines 40-41]) carries a hypothetical air due to the repetition of “as if”—it’s as if the speaker is hesitant to firmly commit to the comparisons. They, too, remain a fantasy or an idealized, unrealized condition.
The diction also gives the poem its sexual atmosphere. Words like “ride” and “bed” (Line 2) allude to sexual motion and intimate spaces. The focus on the woman’s body and touching continues to suggest lust and desire without sexually explicit words. Through diction, Ondaatje creates an erotic language for his poem.
Repetition is a literary device with which the poet repeats certain words or phrases to drive home specific points. The repetition of “cinnamon peeler” (Lines 1, 18, 45-46) highlights the importance of the occupation. Its multiple appearances reflect the number of tasks cinnamon peeling does in the poem. The cinnamon peeler represents an identity for the speaker, the cinnamon symbolizes the speaker’s desire for the woman, and the cinnamon scent represents the power of the speaker’s desire.
“Wife” also appears three times in the poem (Lines 18, 33, and 46). In Lines 18 and 46, the wife links to the cinnamon peeler, as in “the cinnamon peeler’s wife.” In Line 33, the wife instead belongs to the grass cutter—“the grass cutter’s wife.” Through the repetition of “wife,” Ondaatje shows how marriage and the husband’s profession defines a woman's identity.
The repetition of words like “would” and “could” reminds the reader that the poem remains hypothetical. The reader shouldn’t link the poem to reality. The speaker isn’t a cinnamon peeler: What he expresses is a fantasy, an extended metaphor for his desire for his wife, and is therefore liable to romanticization.
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By Michael Ondaatje