Glamour

Glamour is the term for illusionary magic, particularly that used by fairies. Here it is used on multiple occasions, most notably on the faerie queen herself. She uses glamour to make herself appear like a human woman, “yawning and stretching as human women do” (Line 15), and as a tree. Glamour is also used to disguise the majority of Tam Lin’s experience, including the setting and the food that he eats. It represents a veil across the most challenging and potentially traumatic aspects of his time there, as well as a projection of “assemblages constructed from our dreams” (Line 7) — in other words, his own hidden needs and desires.

Butterflies

One of the poem’s most disconcerting moments comes when the speaker recalls live butterflies as a fairy fashion choice: “living butterflies unto their shoulders, / so they moved in a halo of colored dust / and panicked flapping...