Co-teaching English Literature and English Language | Creating a sense of time and place

Night In Venice

Love, in this summer night, do you recall
Midnight, and Venice, and those skies of June
Thick-sown with stars, when from the still lagoon
We glided noiseless through the dim canal?
A sense of some belated festival
Hung round us, and our own hearts beat in tune
With passionate memories that the young moon
Lit up on dome and tower and palace wall.

We dreamed what ghosts of vanished loves made part
Of that sweet light and trembling, amorous air.
I felt in those rich beams that kissed your hair,
Those breezes, warm with bygone lovers' sighs-
All the dead beauty of Venice in your eyes,
All the old loves of Venice in my heart.

John Hay

Co-teaching English Literature and English Language
Creating a Sense of Time and Place - Poetry

What do you think is the effect of having “love” as the very first word in the poem?

How does the poet create a sense of time and place in the first stanza? Look at what he says and how he says it.

The poem is written in the first person (“we” “us” “our” “my”) and the second person “you.” What is the effect of this, do you think?

What do you think is the impact of the second stanza?

This poem is written in the form of a sonnet. Why do you think the poet may have made this choice?

**Now write about the poem Night in Venice, and its effect on you.**