Vocabulary in A Wife in London

Urgently appealing to or pressing against something, as if begging it to move or yield. Here the fog is described as though it is desperately clinging to the city streets.

A warm brownish-yellow colour, like old leather or muddy water. Here it describes the dirty, yellowish fog that hangs over the London streets.

A thick, visible mist or fog hanging in the air. In this poem it refers to the dense, murky fog that wraps around the London streets on the evening the wife receives the telegram.

Rolled or drifted upward, the way fog or smoke rises slowly from below. Here it describes the fog that the city's narrow lanes have sent curling up into the air.

Sounds out sharply and crisply, like a sudden loud snap. It describes the messenger's knock as abrupt and startling against the quiet of the foggy evening.

Transmitted at great speed, the way urgent news is sent by telegraph. It suggests the telegram arrived almost instantaneously, in stark contrast to the slow letter that follows.

Died in battle, a formal and solemn way of saying a soldier was killed in war. The dashes around the word in the poem slow the reader down, mimicking the wife's shock.

The active combat zone where soldiers are fighting, far from home. The letter comes "fresh from the front," meaning it was written while the husband was still alive and at war.

The next day or the day that follows. Here the husband writes about things he planned to do or record the very next day, plans he would never live to carry out.