Mid-Term Break by Seamus Heaney.

I sat all morning in the college sick bay
Counting bells knelling classes to a close.
At two o'clock our neighbors drove me home.

In the porch I met my father crying--
He had always taken funerals in his stride--
And Big Jim Evans saying it was a hard blow.

The baby cooed and laughed and rocked the pram
When I came in, and I was embarrassed
By old men standing up to shake my hand

And tell me they were "sorry for my trouble,"
Whispers informed strangers I was the eldest,
Away at school, as my mother held my hand

In hers and coughed out angry tearless sighs.
At ten o'clock the ambulance arrived
With the corpse, stanched and bandaged by the nurses.

Next morning I went up into the room. Snowdrops
And candles soothed the bedside; I saw him
For the first time in six weeks. Paler now,

Wearing a poppy bruise on his left temple,
He lay in the four foot box as in his cot.
No gaudy scars, the bumper knocked him clear.

A four foot box, a foot for every year.

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Mid-Term Break is a very personal poem, written when Heaney's four year old brother passed away. This poem may make Heaney sound emotionless the way he calls his brother a "corpse" and never revealing his emotions towards this tragedy, however this is how Heany has dealt with this whole ordeal and has added onto the powerful effect this poem has on the reader.

The death of his brother is shown to change Heaney's childhood completely, this event in his life is where he becomes aware of the true brutal reality of the world. We can sense a disturbing undertone to the poem, most clearly seen at the poem's start. Here he still does not know of his brother's death, he is still at school "counting bells knelling classes." The world "knelling" has a direct link to funerals. Heaney is "embarrassed" when men stand up to shake his hand like a man. The last line is very isolated from the rest of the poem,"A four foot box, a foot for every year." This line highlights how young his brother was taken from them, and how unfair life has been on their family.The dramatic shift from innocent school scene to standing next to his dead brother represents the drastic change Heaney went through at the time, from innocent school boy to understanding the harsh realities of life.