Follower By Seamus Heaney

My father worked with a horse- Mapping the furrow exactly.

plough,
His shoulders globed like a full sail
I stumbled in his hobnailed wake,
strung
Fell sometimes on the polished sod;
Between the shafts and the furrow.
Sometimes he rode me on his back
The horses strained at his clicking
tongue. Dipping and rising to his plod.

An expert. He would set the wing I wanted to grow up and plough,

And fit the bright steel-pointed sock. To close one eye, stiffen my arm.

The sod rolled over without breaking. All I ever did was follow

At the headrig, with a single pluck In his broad shadow round the farm.

Of reins, the sweating team turned I was a nuisance, tripping, falling,

round Yapping always. But today
And back into the land. His eye It is my father who keeps stumbling
Narrowed and angled at the ground, Behind me, and will not go away.
Questions:
1. Identify the following devices:
Assonance Metaphor Symbolism Simile

2. What is the theme of the poem?

3. What is the tone of the poem?