The foremost relationship presented in the poem is that of the unnamed protagonist and her sister Maude, the narrator seems to have a deep-seated resentment towards the aforementioned sister. The poem begins with a rhetorical question which is answered with the revelation ‘Oh who but Maude, my Sister Maude’: although a simple answer the fact that her name is not only referred to once, but repeated, suggests that the narrator has strong feelings about what happened as well as being hurt even more knowing that the source of her distress is her own sister.
In addition to this the narrators condemnation of Maude to hell ‘Bide you with death and sin’ and ‘Sister Maude shall get no sleep, Either early or late’ is indicative of the narrators belief that Maude is deserving of an eternity and hell but also her desire for Maude to go to hell because of her betrayal, a punishment she hopes and wants to be eternal and without reprieve.
As well as the betrayal itself perpetrated by Maude the narrator appears to resent her also because of the motives for betraying her saying ‘Though I had not been born at all, He’d never have looked at you’ this choice of words implies that the only reason why Maude did what she did was out of jealousy aimed at the protagonist.
Another relationship within the poem is between the protagonist and her deceased lover. Some of the ways in which she refers to the man seem to convey a sense of regret. ‘You might have spared his soul sister’ by saying this, the narrator seems to believe that her lover may have committed some sort of sin, but still manages to deflect the blame for his shortcoming onto Maude, this seems fairly rational considering that presumably Maude did have a part in the failure of the protagonist’s lover however her ignorance regarding the responsibility of the lover himself shows that whilst to an extent the hate directed towards Maude is justified but may be a accentuated by the narrators view of her lover as being almost infallible.
React!