The Telephone:

1.    The setting the dialogue takes place is inside a woman’s home in a later time where telephones weren't as high-tech as they are now. The relationship between the people in the poem is very subtle. The man is very sure of himself thinking he knows exactly what the woman wants. The woman on the other hand, is very shy, and didn’t want to admit her feelings.
 

2.    The telephone is a form of communication used by different people in different places. The telephone, which is compared to a flower, may suggest it’s what the woman’s voice sounds like on the other side. The name telephone isn’t used much any more, indicating the age of the setting of the poem. When the man, ‘finds the flower (her voice), and drives the bee away (the buzzing sound made by an old phone), he listens and guesses what he thinks she said because the old phone made it too hard to understand what she really did say.
 

3.    The first speaker is a man very full of himself. He interrupts the speaker to because he really believes that he can read the thoughts of the woman. He doesn’t want her to try to deny it so instead he eliminates any room for her to try. He doesn’t tell her what he heard her say because he wants her to admit what she had actually said. The poem shifts to ‘someone’ because he’s trying to play with her. He’s basically stating that obviously someone had to have said it.
 

4.    The second speaker seems to be a shy woman. When asked what she had said, she asked what he thought he had heard because she didn’t want to have to admit her feelings for the man. As the poem continued, he proceeded to try to get her to admit her love. In the end, she admits that she had in fact wanted him to come see her, but made it obvious it had been just a thought.
 

5.    The poem, The Telephone, is about communication as a whole and how defective and sometimes inconvenient it was when it didn’t work. The communication between the two people is ironically not the best. He does most of the talking when she tries to not concede her feelings for the man. The tone of the poem has a kind of playful side from the first speaker’s part, and a shy calm side from the woman’s. In all, the tone brings out a relaxed easy feel to the poem.