How does Vallejo use repetition in the poem, The Black Heralds?

Repetition is a signature device that Vallejo used throughout his career as a poet. The opening line of “The Black Heralds” is repeated as the last line for emphasis and to create an enclosed structure or circle. This enclosure may represent the prison of life that constrains humanity with time limits and physical limitations or the freedoms taken away by government and social status. The phrase, “I just don’t know,” not only ends the first and last lines of the poem but also the first and last lines of the first stanza in order to underline the frustration of the inexplicable.

In the seventeen lines of “The Black Heralds,” Vallejo uses the word “blows” four times: in the first and second lines to establish blows as the subject, in the eleventh line, to remind the reader of the topic, and then in the last line to emphasize the importance of the blows. In addition, Vallejo uses the ellipsis before each of the “I just don’t know” phrases as if the speaker runs out of words and sighs or cries out, “I just don’t know.” The ellipsis is also used in line 5 to create a change of thought, and in line thirteen (“And man . . . Poor . . . poor!”) to stretch out and emphasize the pathetic nature of humans. Vallejo also uses the similar phrases “welled up” and “wells up” in lines four and twelve as another way to provide a connection between the first and the last sections of the poem. Thus repetition serves to tie the poem together and as a type of rhythmic device like a metronome keeping the beat.