SOURCE: Cervo, Nathan. “Rossetti's ‘A Last Confession’.” Explicator 58, no. 4 (summer 2000): 193-95.

In the following essay, Cervo contends that Rossetti works within two conflicting contexts in his poem “A Last Confession”: alchemy and Roman Catholicism.

D. G. Rossetti's dramatic monologue [“A Last Confession”] has been called “operatic” and “Italianate,” and to some extent it is both—which in no way marks it as a major artistic accomplishment. The poem consists of all sorts of musical themes, so to speak—themes that are not stated in words alone but in words combined with a passion that strains them to the point of breaking as undefined symbols expressing both emotion and intuition.

Basically, the poem's mode of expression is a sort of double exposure, with the persona functioning as a palimpsest for the poet's own very real and ultimately decisive presence. Whereas cathexis is the persona's cognitive mode, Rossetti himself is...