What is the narrator point of view in the poem, To Althea, From Prison?

There are two unique features of Lovelace’s use of point-of-view in this poem. One regards perspective, and the other tense.

The poem’s perspective is notable because it remains in first-person throughout. The reason this is surprising is because the poem is titled “To Althea,” suggesting that it should be seen as a direct address to the woman the speaker loves. One might expect to find at least some interpolation of the second-person forms of address (“you” or “thou”), as is common in love poetry. The absence of these shifts in perspective underlines a key facet of the poem: the fact that Althea is not particularly significant to the poem’s meaning. Her relationship with the speaker seems to serve only as a device for creating the poem. She is barely characterized, and not spoken to directly at all.

The other notable shift in perspective is in tense. The poem technically remains in present tense throughout. However, in the third stanza, there is a subtle shift into the future tense. The poem’s repeated use of the word “when” transforms from the sense of something that is happening now to something that “shall” happen in the future (18, 21). This shift in point-of-view reveals the poem’s efficacy as an anthem of hope for the future.