An independent clause is a sentence which has meaning by itself. In the sentence above, which is in the interrogative form, we can see a subject and a predicate. <em>What</em> is the subject and <em>would happen</em> is the predicate, The answer to this question might be: "Something nice would happen". This idea would be independent because extra information is not necessarily needed to comprehend the meaning of the clause.
An independent clause is a clause that can stand alone as a sentence. When you read the sentence "what would happen if love didn’t die? you could use it as a sentence by itself, doesn't need any complement to make sense. On the other hand, the sentence "If the poem is about going mad when love is lost," is the dependent clause, because it needs a complementary sentence to complete the idea.
A rhetorical question is one that makes a point rather than requiring a direct answer: in many cases it may be intended to start a discussion or at least draw an acknowledgement that the listener understands the intended message. A common example is the question "Can't you do anything right?"
