"Church Going" (2565)

In the first stanza, the speaker notes a "tense, musty, unignorable silence,/Brewed God know how long" (7-8). Why would he describe the silence that way?

At the end of the second stanza and the beginning of the third, he says, "the place was not worth stopping for.//Yet stop I did: in fact I often do,/And always end much at a loss like this" (18-20). Why does he keep coming back if he is not satisfied when he does? What does he wonder about the place?

What does he mean by "superstition, like belief, but die" (34)? What does remain after "disbelief has gone" (35)? Note particularly lines 37-38.

Read the final stanza. What does he mean by saying that the church is a place where "our compulsions meet,/Are recognized, and robed as destines" (56-57)? Why will this place never be "obsolete"?

"Aubade" (2570)

What is the speaker afraid of?

What comfort was religion? Why is that no comfort to the speaker now?

Why is "being brave" no use?

Why does the speaker find the coming of the day no comfort, perhaps more painful? What is an aubade? Def. "Music. A piece sung or played outdoors at dawn, usually as a compliment to someone" (from Random House College Dictionary)