"I hope to see my Pilot face to face
when I have crossed the bar."
At the beginning of the poem I thought for sure I knew what it was about. Clearly it was about a man about to embark on a journey across the sea. Then as I got to the last lines of the third stanza I began to realize I might be wrong. Finally as I got to the last stanza it became clear that this poem was not about a physical trip on a sailboat but crossing over from life into death. The imagery used to describe this however parallels perfectly with that of a boat going across the ocean. The sunset and evening star represent the end his life, but he is starting his voyage right now indicating the start of a new life after death. He describes the tide as being asleep so hopefully the passage will be calm when he returns home to heaven just like the tide "Turns again home". Now as the sun continues to set darkness is eminent just as he feels death is. He also hopes there will be no sadness when he must leave. He states that though the flood may bear me far, meaning though he might travel to places far away that he is unsure of, he hopes that when he comes to the other side he will see the Pilot or God's face. The fact that he capitalized the word Pilot is probably a reference to how we capitalize the word God. Overall the imagery sets up a sort of calm but uncertain tone of beginning a voyage on the sea that fit quite well with the image of a man who has accepted that death is coming soon.
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