Explain the symbols/motifs in the poem "Homecoming" by Bruce Dawe.

To begin, both symbol
and motif need to be defined in order to identify and understand how and why they are used.

href="http://brainstorm-services.com/wcu-2005/pdf/symbol-poems.pdf">Symbol:
A person, object, image, word, or event that evokes a range of additional meaning beyond and
usually more abstract than its literal significance.

href="https://www.poetryfoundation.org/learn/glossary-terms/motif">Motif:
A central or recurring image or action in a literary work that is shared by other works and may
serve an overall theme.

Therefore, a symbol can appear
once and remain a symbol. A motif, on the other hand, is a symbol which appears repeatedly
throughout the work.

In regards to the symbols/motifs in Bruce Dawe's poem
"Homecoming," the symbols seen all speak to the motif of death.

Dawe's poem was "written as anfor anonymous soldiers" in the Vietnam War. The
poem tells of the process with which dead soldiers were "processed" for their return
home. The overwhelming symbol in the poem is the use of the word "them."
"Them" are the dead and unidentified soldiers who are being picked up, brought in,
zipped up, tagged, and named.

theyre picking them up,
those they can find, and bringing them home,
theyre bringing them in, piled on the
hulls of Grants, in trucks, in convoys,
theyre zipping them up in green plastic
bags,
theyre tagging them now in Saigon, in the mortuary coolness
theyre
giving them names, theyre rolling them out of
the deep-freeze lockers

Therefore, the symbol of "them" represents the numerous
unidentified bodies. These bodies are then identified as representing the motif of death.

An engaged reader can see that Dawe is not pleased with either the treatment
or the war itself. His tone is rather angry (overly objective which could allude to his actual
subjective nature), while the rhythm matches the drums heard in war times.

 

href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homecoming_%28poem%29">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homecoming_%28poem%29
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href="https://www.poetryfoundation.org/learn/glossary-terms/motif">https://www.poetryfoundation.org/learn/glossary-terms/motif