Here my explanation of the poem. I have put it in a spoiler tag lest anyone wish not to see it.
[spoiler]I hope that you understand the basic context of the poem: it is about a man (the speaker) who is charmed by how well a girl can braid her hair, but he is too afraid to ask her how she does it because he fears coming across awkward if he did ask.
The poem is basically about a kind of power which some women have, which they project through beauty, the mystery of how they harness that power, and its effects: entrapment.
The girl in the poem is a spinster in the true sense of that word. As you may know, the word ‘spinster’ in English means an unmarried woman. It originally meant any woman who spun wool. In the earlier Middle Ages, before the rise of guilds, when domestic industry dominated society in Europe, it was commonly young, unmarried women who spun wool and in time, the word ‘spinster’ slowly came to acquire the meaning which we know today. Although the girl in the poem does not spin, she is nevertheless a woman whose craft lies in textiles (in a sense) as well as being unmarried. Thus, she has a “finger-loom” (line 2).
At the same time, the poem alludes to crafts as ‘mystery’. That is, unless one is taught how to do a craft, it remains completely unknown. In the Middle Ages, guilds were often called ‘mysteries’, (that is what you will find in many documents) because the knowledge of how to do the craft was known to the members of the guild and no one else. On top of that, in a lot of mediaeval literature (which was written by men) women’s lore and crafts were considered to be mystery, and many female symbols, especially the vagina, became symbols of secret female power.
This brings me to my second, and perhaps more significant, theme: knowledge and the power behind it. The poem plays on two words which both imply knowledge. One is the knowledge of how to do something (to wit) and the other is sexual knowledge (to know). In the poem, their meanings run together. The speaker believes that the spinster’s secret knowledge of her craft of braiding her hair is like her virginity; it is intrinsic to the fact that she is a maiden. If he were to ask her and she tell him subsequently, then the secret knowledge of her craft would be known to an individual outside of her ‘mystery’. In a sense, he would be taking away her virginity if she told him about the secret craft of braiding and thus cause her to lose her secret power, because it would no longer be a secret to him. Therefore, a kind of sexual knowledge, and power, is connected with knowing the knowledge of the craft. As such, the speaker fears that if he did ask, the girl would only scold him for watching her. Of course, he does not truly know what her reaction would be in reality, but his fear of rejection conjures up automatic negative thoughts in his mind and he does not do so.
The situation is very frustrating for the speaker because the girl’s braid makes her very beautiful, almost like a siren. The main indicator of the girl’s beauty is her blonde hair; in mediaeval popular culture, it was often held that blonde hair was the most beautiful kind of hair (many likened it to gold). However, her beauty is such that it captivates and ensnares. The fact that the speaker likens her fingers to a spider, implies that she braiding ability is like a spider’s web which traps insects. It also implies that the secret knowledge of braiding might include how to make knots and snares, which the weaver could use to their advantage. Indeed, one could make an allusion to a sonnet written by Edmund Spenser (I have forgotten which one, but I can look it up if you like), in which a woman uses her golden locks of hair to ensnare men in her charm.
Thus, repeated throughout the poem are negatives: “ne wot” (lines 3 and 6), “ne dare” (line 5) which stress denial and prevention. He remains trapped in her knot of beauty. After all, if he knew her craft, he could undo the knots of beauty in which she has ensnared him. But he does not know because he believes that she would only rebuke him if he tried. Thus, he submits to an imaginary judgement by the girl that her craft must remain unknown to him: he “kneel[s] afore [her] doom” (line 6); kneeling before someone is a sign of obedience, as you probably know. He has ensnared himself in his own fallacious thinking, but this fallacious thinking was ultimately effected by the girl’s beauty.
Although it is customary to have the two last lines of the poem repeat the first two in the roundel form, the repetition has another effect here. They serve to demonstrate that speaker remains utterly in awe of the girl and her braid in the end. She remains powerful and he weak and trapped. He has not escaped and perhaps he never will.[/spoiler]
