There seems little chance that the poet would overlook this forcefor ideological impact in Pearl. When a writer so patently insists onrelating form to substance, not only devising both a pattern of lexicalcontinuity and a form of stanzaic structure that work in concert toembody thematic design, but even on occasion exploiting the characteristics of word form to maintain the lexical pattern, then he is clearlylikely to have word form itself figure in the thematic design too.