"Examination at the Womb-Door" by Ted Hughes

The symbolism in this poem is astonishing. It associates every part of the living human body and gives it ownership to not the bearer of these parts but of Death. It is often realized that the only way to reach solace is true death because after all death is the most certain thing we have right after being born. The author is describing every part of his body as a sort of messy, scrawny, scorched and meaningful existence can only find true comfort by reaching it’s true master, and that is Death itself. Yet at the end of the poem we see the last line stating that he is stronger than Death when nothing else is. It can be implied that the author was speaking to Death itself as he last mentions “Pass, Crow” and crow is a well known symbol of death throughout literature, but not only that but of how calm he speaks. As if he knows that his time will come but it will not be today. J.K. Rowling wrote on one of the Harry Potters book “It’s the unknown we fear when we look upon death and darkness, nothing more.” And I couldn’t agree more, but because Death itself does not incite fear upon us, it is the uncertainty of it, the whole mystery behind it, and we as rational beings cannot phantom to go somewhere we do not understand.