The "senseless change" of the groundhog indicates the irrational but ordered controlling force of nature as it causes the particular to decay, decompose, and thus change. Change is embodied in the carcass of the groundhog as Eberhart visits it periodically. Eberhart first views the groundhog as a "cauldron seething" with maggots and the stench of decay. When he returns in the autumn the sap of the groundhog had "gone out" and only the "bony sudden hulk remained." The following summer "there was only a little hair left and bones bleaching in the sunlight." After three years the decomposition has finished and no traces remained. This degeneration subjects particulars (represented by the groundhog) to change and satisfied half the requirements of mutability.

      The tendency towards change is a reversal to the recurrence in nature of similar images of summer. The degree of intensity in the summers is repetitions. The first summer is "vigorous," the next "massive and burning" and after three years "whirling." Although different in meaning, the diction provides a repeated standard of violent, forceful, intense, and ecstatic energy in the summers. Only in the autumn is this vigorous climate missing and that is because nature is becoming dormant. But the imagery of the following summer reports and emphasizes the contrast of the decay in particulars to recurrence in nature - or mutability.

      What contrasting imagery and diction does Eberhart utilize to accentuate his idea of mutability? The initial image puts the life implication of "golden fields" in opposition to "the groundhog lying dead." This image is repeated in the vigorous quality of summer contrasted with the "dead lay he." Eberhart then synthesizes the general vigor of nature with the groundhog ("seeing nature ferocious in the groundhog") in the image of the seething cauldron of maggots and undoubtable putrescence of decay. The emergence of the activity of nature in the groundhog is evidenced in "the fever arose, became a flame/ And vigor circumscribed the skies, immense energy in the sun."

      Further contrast in the imagery and diction is employed in the transformed appreciation the author has for the groundhog and the process which has engulfed it. Upon confronting the groundhog Eberhart's initial reaction was to inspect it "close." Then "half with loathing" of the sight and smell but with a "strange love" (or unusual appreciation), the author became sensitive to the decaying yet renewing processes of nature. The speaker poked the animal, trembled, and then stood "watching the object as before."

      But between the original and ensuing observation a change had occurred in the author. An emotional quality entered his understanding as he stood there. His concern for "keeping reverence for knowledge" seemed to conflict with his attempt "for control, to be still, to quell the passion of the blood." In this instance the emotion, passion, and intensity overshadows his "reverence for knowledge." The image he creates on his knees "praying for joy in the sight of decay" elevates the importance of nature. His joy is based on an emotional rather than a rational appreciation of this step of decay as part of the renewing aspect of nature.

      When the author returns he no longer has the same emotional or passionate appreciation of nature. The word seething has become sodden and no longer has the same activity in its meaning. The cauldron has decayed to the point of being only a "sodden hulk." The time is no longer the vigorous summer but the autumn, when nature dies a little bit as she hibernates. The author has changed also. He returns "strict of eye," more coldly objective, critical, analytical, and uninvolved. Whether a teacher or a student, the "intellectual chains" alludes to the restraint of the author and his dulled senses which no longer provide him with his previous depth of appreciation. He had "lost both love and loathing, mured up in the wall of wisdom." "Love and loathing" indicate the degree to which emotion had entered and left his appreciation. His emotions were buried or mured in the walls of wisdom which indicated an outer façade now enclosed his original passion. His first attitude reversed itself.

      The author returns again and the vigor of summer had revived itself, "massive, burning, and full of life." The groundhog was only bones bleaching in the sunlight. Eberhart's attitude combines appreciation with an intellectual understanding more rational than emotional. The bones are "beautiful," but now the beauty is "as architecture." His perspective was like a geometer -an impassionate but appreciative observer. He cut a walking stick which was to serve the same purpose his first stick had in poking the groundhog - observation. But he does not have the same emotional reaction and conversely notes that the stick is from a "birch" tree. This clearly indicates the change in the nature of his observation.

      The final visit synthesizes the first three. The traces of the groundhog are gone, the summer is once again vigorous (described as "whirling"), and the person tries to view what has taken place with a "withered heart." As he thinks about China which had ascended and declined under the ancient Khans, of Greece which had established high ideals of individualism and the power of the wind and then fallen, of Alexander who had conquered the known world and then had died at an early age, of Montaigne who had been censored because of his views which conflicted with the Church, and Saint Theresa who had to meet death as other mortals did, despite her mystical nature, he understands the subjection of all products of nature to decay. As Eberhart caps his heart with his hand he realizes that he does not have the appreciation that he had had when he had first stood in silence before the groundhog and then fallen to his knees to pray with joy. His appreciation had become his awareness of the comutability in life.

      The final contrast of the "whirling" summer to the "withered heart" (whether withered from age or lost appreciation in the "walls of wisdom") emphasizes his concept of mutability. From the third line of the poem Eberhart compares his frailty with the decaying groundhog and contrasts it to the dominance of nature regenerating herself. Eberhart was not in control but subject to control. "his senses were shaken." He perceived his naked frailty in contrast to the power of the vigorous summer. His senses shook and "wavering aim" contrast to the senseless change provided by nature. Nature is clearly a force whereas Eberhart seems to be merely one who reacts. He reacted when he fell to his knees to pray, kneeling before the power of nature. On the second visit Eberhart lost something in his lack of appreciation. In his third visit he could only recapture an intellectual appreciation. It's as a geometer that Eberhart surveys the groundhog. Finally, he realizes the decline in himself and his sensitivity. He caps a "withered heart." Not only has the groundhog undergone change in relation to nature but China, Greece, Alexander, Montaigne, Saint Theresa, and now Eberhart have "withered." The decay has been of the particular but summer (representing nature) has remained vigorous and whirling. The contrast of death and life, of emotional and intellectual appreciation, and most significantly Eberhart's feeling of degeneration yields the idea that the world is in a state of change with individual products eventually decaying but nature regenerating. By definition Eberhart has completed his idea of comutability.