"Digging""Digging" by Seamus Heaney is the first poem in the first complete volume of Heaney's poems, "Death of a Naturalist". “Death of a Naturalist” is about the transition to adulthood and the loss of innocence. The poem shows how Heaney admired his father and grandfather, especially their hard work. Even though Heaney did not follow in their footsteps and become a farm laborer, he respects the work they do, especially their ability to dig. The poem is a free verse poem. It has eight stanzas with two couplets. It rhymes occasionally, but has no structured rhyme. The first two lines rhyme with “thumb” and “gun”, the second verse also has some rhyming words. The poem is a first-person narrative; this is evident from the first line using the word “my” and other lines using words like “I” and “we.” The title refers to the poem because all three generations mentioned are digging. His father dug potato seeders and flower beds, his grandfather dug peat and he is digging up the past. For this reason, the title is very appropriate. Throughout the poem Seamus Heaney uses tense changes to convey his memories and his determination for the future. It begins in the present tense when he sees his father struggling with the flowerbed. The poem then moves into the past to remember his grandfather's work digging peat and his father's stronger days digging potato seeders. The poem returns to the present during the last two stanzas. The final line is in the future tense to show that Seamus understands that his job is to write. The first stanza of the poem says that the pen in his hand fits “like a gun” (line 2. The second stanza is Heaney looking down is a window to s......middle of paper... …” as they fill the bucket Another change occurs in the second stanza when the speaker says that “they piled up the fresh berries in the barn” (line 17 ). “Byre” means shed, but can also be a support for a coffin or a corpse. This foreshadows what is to come. The berries begin to rot because more have been harvested than could be eaten in time mushroom, satiated with our supply" (line 19) came to them. The berries would have lasted longer if they had been left on the bush, but the desire and greed overwhelmed the speaker when he picked the delicious berries because he lost the berries to rotting, the speaker says, “I always felt like crying. It wasn't right / That all the delicious cans smelled like rot. / Every year I hoped they would continue, I knew they wouldn't" (lines 22-24). The speaker picks berries every year, more berries than necessary, and always sees them go bad.