Answer

There is a real sense of fertility and life at the end of the first stanza with the line ‘they sucked the pulp of plum and peach’. In fact this almost seems crude as if they are celebrating in a vulgar manner. The alliteration of the ‘p’ sound emphasises the vulgar, harsh sucking sounds and the onomatopoeia of ‘sucked’ emphasises the vulgarity further.

The lost of ‘they sang, they jested and they laughed’ also shows how much fun they were having, making it sound like it goes on for ever.

The ‘plod, plod’ repetition in stanza 2 emphasises the weary sadness of the funeral to come, perhaps.