The Haunted Beach

The structure of Mary Robinson’s “The Haunted Beach” perfectly parallels the content of the poem in a jarring manner that leaves the reader feeling somewhat uncomfortable. The poem emphasizes the idea of permanence, a concept that we have seen before in other romantic poems; however, unlike the permanence desired in a poem like “Bright Star” this permanence appears, as the title suggests, as somewhat haunting – a ghost that cannot be shaken off. The cause of which is of course, the guilt of the Fisherman.

The poem has a rhythmic flow to it, mimicking the undulating waves of the ocean that are mentioned in every stanza. The lines themselves visually imitate waves in the way that they are printed on the page, alternating between being indented or not. Within each stanza is a steady rhyme scheme that is broken by a rhyming couplet in the 7^th and 8^th line and followed by the final 9^th line to complete the previous rhyme. This pattern somewhat mimics the rising and breaking of waves – lines 7 and 8 represent the crescendo of the wave as it reaches is peak before finally crashing in line 9 – fittingly, always the line mentioning the “green billows.”

The repetition of this pattern throughout the poem helps emphasize the fact that there is no escaping the ebb and flow of the ocean in the way that there is no way for the Fisherman to escape his guilt. We especially see this in the final stanza which takes place thirty years after the murder, “day after day more weary;/ For Heav’n design’d his guilty mind/ Should dwell on prospects dreary” (75-76). Robinson accurately depicts the feeling of guilt by describing it as a “strong and mystic chain” (77) that prevents him from straying. Like the ocean, and the structure of the poem, the Fisherman is unable to escape the guilt he has created for himself and thus must live with it until his death – or the end of the poem.