I see

This poem by Felicia Hemans appears to contain a similar tone to the Sonnets of Charlotte Smith - the dramatization of the melancholy. Unlike Smith, however, Hemans does not provide a compelling illustration or explication of this delicate theme.

This poem Second Sight begins: "A mournful gift is mine, oh friends!/A mournful gift is mine!," and unfortunately, these two ineffectively, melancholy lines serve as the poems chorus in the eighth stanza. Hemans' direct address to her audience as "oh friends!" appears to be a bit too comfortably stated - I, as a member of Hemans' audience for one, do not think of her as a friend and reflexively, do not wish to be addressed as such. The poem further deteriorates as Hemans aligns the soul with "the flow of song and wine" and compares its "woe" to "the faded flower/Midst the rich summer's glow." This cliched imagery does not provide a compelling dramatization of the melancholy - rather, it exponentially cultivates the artificial emotionalism of Hemans' initial lines.

The most disenchanting aspect of Hemans' poem, however, is her consistent and obvious use of sensory description. The phrase "I see" is used three times and the phrase "I hear" is used twice - the poem is only 40 lines long, and therefore, appears to the critical reader to be completely dominated by these juvenile devices. Hemans appears to be unable to sophistically portray imagery and emotions through independent description (like her Romantic contemporaries Coleridge in particular), in which, the poet uses methaphors to combine imagery and emotion. Hemans' notions of grieving, sadness,and shadows are not successfully illustrated through melancholy dramatic devices, but rather, appear shallow and juvenile in their transmission.

One is led to ask: is Felicia Hemans one of the female Romantics whose poetry has been recently criticized for lacking any profound structure or substance? From this critic's perspective, Hemans' poetry contains only one aspect that literary critics are attracted to - the mere fact that its author is a woman.