Answer 1

The poet, while leaving her parent’s home, observes her mother’s pallid face. For the poet, the ‘ashen’ face of her mother, lost of all vitality and colour, bears resemblance to a corpse. She realises, with pain, that her mother has grown old and is nearing her death. Such thoughts make her recollect her childhood fear and anxiety of losing her mother. The idea of getting separated from her mother distresses her. Even her smiles are an expression of her helplessness at the face of what is inevitable.