Get out the microscope, because we’re going through this poem line-by-line.Line 1
I placed a jar in Tennessee,
<span>This first line gives us some straight forward action. We've got a jar, a speaker, and a setting (Tennessee). <span>This jar may even be a particular, popular jar, the Dominion Wide Mouth Special, which was all the rage, or at least as much of a rage as fruit jars can be, around the time that this poem was written.</span>The particular jar doesn't matter so much, though, as the general idea of a jar as something man-made and ordinary. <span>Also, don't forget the other meaning of the word "jar"—something sudden and unpleasant. When you're riding in a car, and the driver brakes out of the blue, you could call it "jarring." We wonder if this jar is going to… jar anything in the poem to come.</span></span>Line 2And round it was, upon a hill.
<span>This line gives us more detail about both the jar and where it was placed. The jar is round, which is no big surprise. It's emphasized that this is just a run-of-the-mill jar. The jar isn't just placed in Tennessee, but on a hill in Tennessee. When we think hill, we think round. Hills are soft, much rounder and calmer than jagged mountains. We can imagine this jar, sitting perfectly on the crest of a little hill.Though this jar is an outsider, placed by a human on this hill, already we can see it as the king of its little territory, looking down upon everything around it.</span>Lines 3-4<span>It made the slovenly wilderness
Surround that hill.</span>
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