Sound

There is some effective use of repetitionrepetition: Where a phrase or word is repeated several times to emphasise or make a particular point. in the poem:

• The "I must scrub and bake and sweep" in line 3 is echoed by the "I must work" in line 9, reinforcing the repetitive, unending nature of her work.
• Line 10 mirrors line 2, giving a feeling of finality and enclosure to the poem.

The strong regular rhythmrhythm: The pattern of stressed and unstressed syllables in a line of poetry. emphasises the physical side of the woman's work: the beat falls on "rise", "dawn", "kneel", "blow" in line 1, for example, as if hammering out her tough routine.

There is a lot of alliterationalliteration: Words strung together with repeated (often initial) consonants, eg Max made many men mad. and assonance [assonance: Words that sound the same through the use of similar vowels or consonants, eg hot and slop or fold and filled. ] in the poem. For example:

• The repeated b and k and p sounds in scrub and bake and sweep (line 3) emphasise how hard and physical the woman's work is
• The long l sounds in lie long (line 5) help to convey the laziness of the young women.
• We can hear the girls sighing in the assonance of line 8 - sigh if the wind but lift a tress - while the soft rhyme in lines 7 and 8 - idleness / tress emphasises the gentle way in which they spend their days.