In a March 1993 interview with David Bradt, Kenyon says about her poems:
"Almost always if I search I can find something in the natural world -- an objective correlative in Eliot's phrase -- that embodies what I'm feeling at the moment. That's when a poem really takes off. For instance, I wrote a poem recently called 'Coats', in which I'm going into Dartmouth Hitchcock Hospital and a man is coming out of the hospital with a distraught look on his face, carrying a woman's coat over his arm. I see that, and I know what's happened. That poem threw itself at my feet: 'Write me! Write me!' I found that my talking about the coats -- the man's coat and the woman's coat -- I was able to write the poem. I made up the part about the man's coat in this poem. I say that even though the day was warm, he had zipped his own coat and tied the hood under his chin, as 'if preparing for irremediable cold.' It's only three stanzas long, about twelve lines, and it's all about the coats. Maybe he was taking his wife's coat to the cleaner. I doubt it; the emotional truth for me was that he had lost his wife. Lots of people would walk past that man without seeing his situation. I couldn't help seeing it!"
After carefully reviewing the definition of Eliot's objective correlative here, look at one Kenyon poem in the packet and discuss, much in the way she herself discusses the creation of "Coats," how the situation/location/thing in the poem evokes an emotion.
You also have the option of picking one poem and arguing why you think Kenyon fails at the objective correlative. What is it about the situation/location/thing in the poem that doesn't translate into an emotion? Or does the poem simply state the emotion too explicitly? How would you have altered the poem to produce a deeper reader response?
Remember, you must post by noon on Tuesday, and you need at least 500 words to receive credit.
The title of the poem I wrote about is called “In the Nursing Home.” This poem evokes emotion out of me right from the beginning. Whenever I hear of the phrase nursing home it is sad. This is because nursing homes just remind me of elderly people who are so old that they are not able to live by themselves. It also reminds me of death because these people who live there are going to be dying soon. It was very thought provoking when Kenyon compared the female in the nursing home to a horse who grazes a hill pasture that someone makes smaller and smaller by coming every night to pull the fences in and in. I thought that Kenyon is trying to compare the horse’s ability to feed with the woman’s ability to function as a person. It made me think that this woman was once able to go out and about and live on her own but is now confined to what she has become, old and dying.
ReplyDeleteThe poem then goes on to talk about how she, like a horse, no longer runs wide loops or tight circles. This whole simile allows me to visualize this woman first being young and able to graze all over like a horse, and then not being able to do much, like a horse no longer moving much to eat. This again evokes even more emotion because it makes me think that she is, again, old and dying. She is no longer able to function a lot or even a little. When Kenyon describes how the poor woman, again as a horse, drops her head to feed but the grass is dust and the creek bed is dry, it shows that she is no longer able to eat. The woman is dying, again, sad. Just the fact that the grass is dust resembles death because it is no longer green and living. When the creek bed is described, it puts in my mind a depressing thought because I always think of dead fish at the bottom lying on the mud because there is no longer any water. They are both no longer full of life. They are also not able to be the source of living for any other animal too.
The last two lines of the poem were sad too of course. However, this also provoked a sort of hopefulness for this woman. I understood these two lines to mean that the horse’s master was going to come and save the horse. He is going to find it some adequate food so that it can survive. When it comes to the woman, I took these lines to mean that the master is some type of angel coming to take the poor woman off to a place like Heaven when she passes. I thought of this because a master can be a higher being. I also thought of how people always say “go to the light” to get into Heaven, as a common saying when people are dying.
The poem titled “Inpatient” is the poem, which I chose to write about. Whenever I hear the word inpatient I always think about how my grandfather had to get everything done right then and there and how much he could not stand waiting in the doctor’s office as a patient for a simple ten to fifteen minute checkup with the doctor. After reading this poem, it really made me realize how much I miss him, but at the same time, how thankful I am that he is in a better place with all of his friends.
ReplyDeleteWhen I first read this poem, “Inpatient,” I never really got what I feel was the true meaning behind it. After reading it through a couple of times, it made me think about what must have been going through my dad’s head when my grandfather was taken to the hospital. He knew that his father was not going to be around much longer and that it might be the last time my grandfather was ever going to be at home surrounded by his loved ones.
The first two lines of the poem, “The young attendants wrapped him in a red velour blanket, and pulled the strapping taut,” to me, meant that even though he was strapped into a stretcher and all bundled up, the old man’s soul and spirit were still free like they always had been. I also took the red of the blanket to have some type of significant meaning such as red roses mean love, compassion, and respect; the red velour blanket might have meant that same thing. In the fourth and fifth lines of the poem, it says, “for the last time, he raised his head and sniffed the air like a wild animal.” That was one of my favorite lines because it was talking about the old man’s last breath of fresh air outside of his home and I just though that it was an awesome way of saying that he was enjoying, perhaps, his final breath of nice, pure, fresh air. Even though this old man was sedated and strapped into a stretcher, he was still free in his mind and soul, like that of a wild animal.
In the fifth and sixth lines, Kenyon writes, “A wedge of geese flew honking over us.” I believe that the geese flying over and honking at them symbolized the angels playing their instruments on his ascension into heaven. I also think that this line could have meant that the geese were comforting him, his family, and the attendants taking him out on the stretcher, that the geese were relaying a message to everybody that everything was going to be all right and not to worry because the old man was going to be free and in a better place. In the next line, Kenyon writes, “a drop of rain flew on his upturned face.” I feel that this simple drop of rain was a teardrop from God above, crying because he knew that heaven was taking such a good man from everyone whom he had touched. I also think that that little drop of rain signified that this was that man’s last touch with the beauty of nature.
In this poem, it seems that Kenyon is writing about a younger family member, holding his grandma’s red-letter New Testament and empty vase. I think that this is showing one how the person holding these belongings knows that his or her grandfather is not going to make it, and he has passed on the grandmother’s belongings to him or her. Also, the sliding door which the nurse wheels him through, I feel, could be related to purgatory and that, yes indeed, his father passed through purgatory and was going to be in heaven. I also think that the sliding glass door could signify that as a sliding door is easy to open and close, it is just as easy for a person’s life to end and to be taken away.
Finally in the last line, Kenyon writes that as the family is entering the hospital, and without even saying anything, they leave the old man’s street clothes in the suitcase in the car because they know that his time has come and he will not be needing them. One never really realizes the significance of some simple street clothes mean unless he or she knows that they will never again see that person in those same clothes.
As I read the packet if Kenyon’s poems, I found myself disappointed. I felt as though her words did not evoke many significant emotions from me, and I struggled to find a poem that impressed me. I feel as though Kenyon wrote about everyday occurrences in her life and her poems came off as seemingly non-important. My inability to connect with Kenyon and her words made me think that I may be missing something about her writing that is more artistic that I am currently lead to believe. Maybe the significance in her writing is that she did not take everyday occurrences for granted, and maybe I do not appreciate her writing because I often fail to “stop and smell the roses” per say. Regardless, I am interested to know how and why Kenyon’s poetry has been published and what exactly I am missing.
ReplyDeleteLooking at “Not Writing,” my point about Kenyon’s writing may be made clear. The poem is extremely short and appears to be writing about a wasp that is unable to enter its nest for a reason that is uncertain to the reader and the author. What emotions are created in this poem? Aside from confusion, I really am not certain. I see a wasp that moves about outside of a grey nest which seems to be a regular event in the grand scheme of life. What are we supposed to feel from these words? As I tried to analyze the poem, I looked to the title for answers. However, the title served to deepen my confusion. “Not Writing?” What does “Not Writing” have to do with a wasp that cannot enter a nest? Kenyon, I need answers!
In order to make the poem stronger, I would suggest to Kenyon that she picked a more appropriate title that actually tied in with the words of the poem. A title that sets the tone for the poem would be efficient and could create a stronger message by preparing the reader for what is going to be expressed in the poem. Kenyon’s poem provides a simple scene, but does it really succeed in providing an “objective correlative?” I do not think so. If it did, I suppose I would not be wondering what emotion that I am supposed to be feeling after reading the poem.
Digressing from “Not Writing,” I attempted to find a poem to which I could actually relate. I found myself drawn to the simplest poem in the collection, “Suggestion From a Friend.” The poem is two lines in length and states: “You wouldn’t be so depressed/ if you really believed in God.” To me, this poem hit home. My dad, a devout Catholic, often says to me that if I am in pain, sad, depressed, or even tired, I should “offer it up to God,” meaning that God may take away anything that makes me feel weak. God is often used as the “answer” in my household, the sole reason for living. Thus, I am taught to dedicate my life to God, to believe that God will lead me to where I need to go, and to feel God’s presence whenever I am lonely. I often find that whenever I lose sight of my faith and God, I enter into a dark state of being. Only when I “really [believe] in God” do I find myself complete. Poems like “Suggestion from a Friend” are the types of writing that bring me back to my faith when I am drowning in hopelessness. In terms of “objective correlation,” “Suggestion From a Friend” creates an image in my head where one friend approaches Kenyon who is at home, unwashed, and curled under a blanket with the lights dim. Kenyon is pitying herself, and the friend attempts to snap Kenyon out of depression by bringing back hope and faith to her via God. The image that Kenyon creates from this poem is made stronger in me, because I am able to relate to the situation. I am not sure that the poem would be as powerful to all of Kenyon’s readers, especially not to those readers who are anti-God.
While analyzing some of Jane Kenyon’s poetry, I choose to write about her poem entitled “Coming Home at Twilight in Late Summer,” because of my immediate connection I established with the location Kenyon describes. First of all, the title of the poem sparks an initial setting. Frequently, I associate late summer days at my family summer home in Bloomingdale, Michigan on Scott Lake. Summer encompasses an entire new spectrum of freedom that usually eliminates the need of haste, yet my journey to the summer home is different. After an almost three hour drive on a Friday evening, I am lucky to see the glimpse of the sun setting over the calm, rippled water. Since my freshman year of college erased a defined location of belonging, or home, this cottage tucked on a double sized water front hits the best idea of home and yearning relaxation for me. There, in August, the days are still long, and the air is stiff and humid with the desire to merely lie in the hammock underneath the overgrown trees. Sadly, like Kenyon’s poem, the chance for relaxation does not come without the price of work and delayed chores.
ReplyDeleteThe first stanza of the poem encompasses the ending of the journeys back “home.” For me, the haste to get to Michigan is full of suspense like Kenyon’s “sparks from a fire” in line three. I definitely cannot wait to slip into my bathing suit and thrown a line into the glassy water… complete ease. Although, the daylight is closing and the air is getting cooler by the time I arrive on a late Friday afternoon, I recognize the immediate work on the quaint, old cottage. Specifically, Kenyon’s fifth line “the grass needed mowing” (set off by an ellipse) clearly represents the tired look needed on the home. This phrase demonstrates the most tedious or laborious task. Sorting through papers or unpacking a suitcase is rarely backbreaking labor, yet cutting an acre of grass is beyond time consuming. With the later summer days, the weather is humid, and I remember the painful cuts and blisters I would get from the levers on the old John Deere mowers. Even getting to the cutters is tedious enough with the green and yellow machine set in the back of the shed beneath the lawn chairs and water toys. Just adding the task in the imaginary “To Do” list is tiring enough. Another line that catches my attention is the manner in which Kenyon describes how the passengers exit the vehicle “climbed stiffly out of the car.” I definitely connect with her image of an aching passengers cramped in a tiny car for hours to get home. The three hour drive is long enough, but more noticeable is the change from the ice cube car environment to the thick, wet air. I agree and remember her line seven, just the background noise from the engine, is noticeable in this new location.
Kenyon’s second stanza is more exclusive compared to that of my Michigan home. The pear trees can parallel with the waterfront on my family’s property. Both are natural elements that sprout life. The tree in Kenyon’s line eight and nine depict the “grateful” fruit, while the water at my home provides various species of fish. One of my favorite activities to do while at home is to go fishing in our front yard. Two summers ago, my father rebuilt our dock. I am at ease as I sit in a lawn chair at the edge of the dock with my line in the water, bobber bouncing away at tomorrow’s breakfast. I feel the warmth of the sun as it heats my skin; the beauty in the location is unremarkable and unmistakable. This poem clearly evokes the feeling of summer at Michigan for me, but more importantly it evokes an emotional sense of desired ease where many readers can easily connect.
The poem I am discussing is “The Call”. In this poem “The Call” it evokes a lot of emotion because it talks about getting a call at 4:13 in the morning about something bad that happened to your mom. Already there is so much emotion because since it is so early in the morning you are all ready startled by the ringing of the phone. Then when you hear that something bad happened you just jump out of bed and try to get where every you need to be as fast as you can. The way the situation in this poem evokes emotion is by being waken up in the wee hours of the morning by a dramatic call. In this poem he received a call about his mother in a nursing and that something bad has happened to her. You can tell what emotion he is having because it say’s in the second paragraph that “still startled I sat up in bed” and “ he’s speeding now to the nursing home with clarity that fear alone confers”. In those two line you can tell how he is feeling because he is still startled when he sat up and he speeding on the way to the nursing home and probably a lot of thoughts are running through his mind like what if he doesn’t make it in time.
ReplyDeleteThe location of the poem evokes emotion because it take place in the early morning and in a nursing home. The reason the early morning evokes emotion is because you have just gotten out of the most comfortable place which is the bed. Then you had a rude awakening and you had to spring out of bed and drive to the nursing home. It is also still dark because the sun has not risen yet. Since it is still dark it get really uncomfortable because the dark is a scary place and it just makes you feel like everything around you is closing in on you. Also the reason the nursing home evokes emotion is because the nursing home is a scary place. It is scary because it is were you take old people who you can’t help or that can’t live by themselves. Also when you send a family there you want the best for them so you know even though you feel bad that you are sending them there. You just have to realize that the people at the nursing home can give them better care than you can. The nursing home is even more scarier when you get a call at 4:13 in the morning about something bad that has happened to one of your family members and that you need to hurry up and get there.The nursing home and the time that the nursing home called showed great emotion to me in this poem.
The the call in the evoke emotion by that there always is a problem when you get a call. Either somebody has a question to ask you or their is some problem about you. When you get a call you always have to prepare yourself for the worst. Especially when it is in the middle of the night. The middle of the night is the worst time to get a call because you should always expect that really is something wrong or important that someone has to tell you at that particular time. In this case he has gotten a call from the nursing home about his mother and that something bad has happened to her. This probably really scared him because he was already startled by the phone call and then he heard the bad news about his mom. So the call in the middle of the night probably all ready made him a little nervous and the when he found out that it was about his mom the probably became really freaked out. Through out the poem there were some many emotions even in the title the “The Call” there were emotions.
The poem that really struck me was “The Needle,” just because out of all the poems that she wrote in the packet, this is the one that I connected with most right away. The title of the poem actually drew me to it in the first place because since being in the medical field, I automatically thought it had something to do with that. Once I started reading the poem though, the details of the grandmother brought back memories of not my grandmother, but my great-grandma when she was in a nursing home when I was younger. It made me think of how old she was, but yet she still had perfectly white hair, yet fading away as the days went by, but still perfect to me. Her skin was delicate, and she looked as if she could be broken if anyone touched her. The nursing home she was at was always very welcoming and would give us the update on how she was doing when we walked in. I remember always having to wash my hands before entering and then as I left.
ReplyDeleteIn the first stanza describing the grandmother, it really helped me to see what her grandmother looked like. She describes her grandmother as being “as pale as Christ’s hands on the wall above you.” I liked how she made a reference to Christ in this poem because to me it shows that maybe she is a religious woman, and that when she dies she knows that he’s watching over her and will show her to the light. In my family, we have always been fairly religious, especially my great- grandma. She used to go to church every day, and even in the nursing home, when she was able to go she did every Sunday. I just think it was a really good touch to the poem.
Also, the part that really hit me was at the end in the last stanza when she was talking about how she hated coming to see her grandmother. I feel for her because I do remember how hard it was to go the nursing home and see all of the old people in their beds or being rolled around in a wheel chair, and here I was young and walking around without a care in the world. It seems like she feels she isn’t making a difference is she goes and sees her grandmother because she thinks that she can’t hear her when she talks to her. My family would go see my great- grandma, and it was just so hard because she was suffering from Alzheimer’s. Being so young, I always thought that maybe she would be able to understand what I was saying and maybe talk to me, but then I realized that it was kind of like talking to a brick wall. Like Kenyon, I just kept talking because I knew that no matter what someone would hear me if not her. Kenyon just seemed to try to make the best out of the situation because that’s all you can really do in that situation. You have to keep trying even if you know you will never get back anything.
After reading the poem, “The Needle” I felt sad. This is because this poem deals with aging a young girl watching her grandmother as she slowly changes with age. As she looks at her grandmother she notices that all she sees is the white color that surrounds her body. The color that used to posses her body is no longer there and her grandmother will soon not have the color that it takes to be alive. The granddaughter gets lost in thought as she is looking at her grandmother. I think this is because she realizes that this will be her someday. No one can stay young forever. She blinks to let go of her daydream and finds herself staring g at her grandmother lying in her bed again
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Then the emotion of remembering the past is brought up. The granddaughter thinks back to a time that her grandmother told her that she was in love with her grandfather and how much she weighed. She was young and lively and had a good life. As she looks at her grandmother again, I am sure she can see a frail human being who is slowly succumbing to age.
As she looks at her grandmother’s sunken hand, I feel sad once more, because she is remembering the life that her grandmother had with her grandfather and the marriage that they had. However, the wedding band does not fit her frail hand anymore. “The soft ring is loose on her hand”, although the ring fit her well in the past he body is slowly slipping away.
Her granddaughter explains how she “hates coming here”. This could be for many reasons. I am sure she hates seeing her grandmother in a fragile state and not living life how she had in the past. She can no longer live the life that she once had, but remember it fondly. Another reason might be that her granddaughter realizes that the aging process will happen to everyone and she fears for the time that it will be her turn to age.
I think that in this poem, Kenyon is trying to explain that everyone must deal with the effects of getting older, that aging is a part of life. Even though it may scare people to thin about losing those that we love to old age, it is a fact that must be dealt with. Age is something that cannot be stopped; it will slowly take over our lives. However, it should not stop us from living life to the fullest and making the memories that we will be proud to tell our grandchildren in the future. This poem is able to develop so much emotion is its refers because it is a poem about a subject that many hold close to heart. Although this poem evoked a sad emotion in me, I also realized how true it was. Kenyon chose to write about something that has an impact on all people. This poem is something that everyone can relate to.
When reading through Jane Kenyon’s poems, one poem in particular caught my eye titled “Philosophy in Warm Weather.” Just the title itself brings out emotions and feelings within me that I have related to warm weather. The sound of warm weather alone brings a smile to my face. I love the summer when it’s sunny and warm outside. It is when I feel my best physically and mentally. There is something about warmth that puts ones mind into a completely content and relaxed state. Warm weather just makes all of your joints and body parts feel good. Why do you think all senior citizens move to Florida, California, Arizona, or any other hot climate? I especially love the warm weather when I am at my cottage in Bloomingdale, Michigan on Scott Lake. (didn’t know jen had a cottage on there too!!) That is my safe haven. Time stops when I am up there enjoying the outdoors, especially the warm weather. My most memorable times are spent lying on the back of my dad’s speedboat basking in the sun enjoying the fresh air and the sounds of summer.
ReplyDeleteIn her first two lines Kenyon expresses a state of relaxation and calmness stating “Now all the doors and windows are open, and we move so easily through the rooms.” The use of the word easily provokes in me a relaxed and laid-back state. I picture a person walking through a house with no stress or worries on their mind. This feeling of the body moving easily through the house brings me back to the point of how warm weather relaxes the body and makes it easy for one to move. It reminds me of the times at my cottage where I am swimming freely in the water while soaking up the hot rays of the sun. Also, she refers to movement in the first line of her second stanza stating that “All around physical life reconvenes.” Meaning that the physical aspect of life comes together in the warm weather. Again inferring the fact that warm weather allows one to move without struggle or pain. When I read this line I pictured not only people, but also plants and animals fully enjoying life in the warm atmosphere. The image of plants and flowers being in full bloom while animals of all kinds are running around in the fresh and beautiful environment appears in my mind. She sums this up beautifully in the second stanza stating “The molecules of our bodies must love to exist.” The use of the word love made me think of the feeling of love in relation to living. She then concludes her second stanza stating that it was the heat that makes our bodies so free and lively. Heat is the cause of this relaxing and happy environment.
She then goes on to conclude her poem talking about certain animals and how they are acting in this lovely warm weather. Overall, I think Kenyon did an excellent job evoking emotion with her word choice and imagery throughout the poem. I immediately felt immersed in the poem the minute I began to read it. She brings out emotions of love, happiness, relaxation, and peace throughout her poem. The imagery and emotion that I felt, perfectly encompassed the overall content of the poem. As she begins to state in her title saying “Philosophy in Warm Weather,” I conclude saying that it makes one comfortable and happy. It allows the body and mind to relax and enjoy the little things in life. Warm weather affects not only human beings, but also all other aspects of life. I thoroughly enjoyed reading this poem as well as the others in the packet.
I choose to write about the poem titled “Drawing from the Past”. This poem reminds me of the joys of being a child and the interesting ways children look at the world. This poem was about a young child who must be about four years old because the author mentions it is September and the older brother is at school. I thought it was quite interesting how the author never mentions the gender of the child so anyone can read this and see themselves as being this child. This poem also makes me remember times when I was little and got to be at home from school because I was sick and my older brother went to school and i would sit in bed as my mom made me lunch. In the poem it says “I was alert to the joy of eating sandwiches alone with mama” and I think this is one of the most important emotion evoking line. It seems that it is the simple pleasure of spending time alone with someone you are care about that creates this emotion. In this poem the child is not doing anything truly exciting with their mom, it is not a fancy restaurant, or a fancy meal, but simple tomato on white bread. The emotion I got from this piece is the feeling of love, and happiness. When I read this poem I think of spending time alone with my mom without my brothers around and I remember feeling so special like no one could ever understand how I felt at that moment. Later in the poem the writer moves on to talk about the child sitting there at the table tracing drawings in the wood and the child is thinking about how she has never been as good as a drawer as their brother and that was something she was very aware of or as author puts it “ alert to”. From these last two stanza the emotion I get from the scene of drawings be traced and the thought of not being good at drawing, is the emotion of frustration and disappointment. I remember as a child, being a year younger than my brother and always feeling like I could never do anything as good as him and this always frustrated me. I was always very alert to the things he did better than me. However, in this poem, even though the child admits that they were not as good of a drawer as their brother and perhaps this was frustrating, at the same time it seems that while sitting at the table enjoying time with their mom, nothing else matters. So by taking this simple concept of drawing images on a table an emotion is created without the author ever explicitly stating any emotions. The author never says I was happy to be sitting at the table with my mom or I felt peaceful knowing I had this special time with her that no one else got. The author also never had to say that the child was frustrated she couldn’t draw as well as their brother. However, because of the way the poem is written we are still able to feel this emotion.
ReplyDeleteA nursing home is usually not a place I look forward to going to. I never know how to act towards the patients living there, I can’t help but feel sadness and pity for most of them and it always smells funny. My dad’s mom died in a nursing home because of Alzheimer’s disease and I hated going there. My mom’s grandma is in a nursing home at the age of 99, but she is still doing great and I actually love to go to the nursing home to visit her. I chose to do the poem In the Nursing Home because it really relates to my grandma on my dad’s side that passed away. Kenyon’s poem uses a metaphor for a horse throughout the poem. I was able to imagine exactly what she was writing about this horse, but I also imagined my grandma and the nursing home she was in. I think this poem is supposed to make anyone who has had an experience with someone in a nursing home create an image of them.
ReplyDeleteThe first stanza says that she is like a horse grazing, which was immediately like my Grandma Eleanor because with the Alzheimer’s it makes them indifferent to the world around them, like a horse grazing nonchalantly. It next said it was grazing in a pasture that seemed to be getting smaller every night as if someone was pulling the fences in. I got a distinct visual of a pasture getting smaller and smaller, but it also evokes the idea of someone in a nursing home’s last days closing in around them because it is almost a countdown to death. This is like my grandma because we could see how she got worse and worse as time went on and she stopped remembering our names and eventually that we were even family of hers.
The next stanza describes how the horse has stopped running wide loops, probably because it is too old and she physically can’t anymore. My grandma always used to walk all throughout the day. We could count on at least walking around with her even though she didn’t know who we were and couldn’t communicate with us. But her mind forgot even how to walk. The poem next said how the horse drops her head to feed but the grass is dust and the creekbed is dry. My grandma always had a great appetite, but her mind lost the instinct to eat. I think the grass is dust and the creekbed is dry because food didn’t mean anything to her anymore, she just ate because it was put in front of her and someone fed her.
The last stanza is very sad. It says Master, come with your light halter and bring her in. I first interpreted it to be like a family asking staff of the nursing home to come take your loved one because they had to leave. But I then realized it was probably more of a call to God. He is the Master Kenyon is referring to, leading whoever with a light hand. It is a family asking God to take my grandma, because she seems in pain and cannot live like this anymore.
Though Descartes would have it out for me, I refuse to believe that our memories and emotions are characterized by anything less than sensory associations and experiences. When I take a sip of cheap, port, wine I think of Charles Bukowski and the wine-stained journals he filled with his words; I’m immediately saddened and humbled. This happens nearly every time; thus, I have an aversion to port wine (whether it be $5 or $500). Suppose, I offered you a sip of my wine—what would you think? Or, take my mother for instance. Every morning when we’re together, we sit down for coffee and she always uses the same mug. The mug belonged to her late sister and seems to glue my mother’s lips together when she drinks. As we sit in silence, I try to imagine what thoughts or memories of my aunt seem to be flowing through my mother’s mind.
ReplyDeleteIn Jane Kenyon’s ‘What Came to Me,’ the voice in the story comes across a gravy boat that belonged to their deceased mother. The voice spots a leftover pinch of gravy, now hardened, on the lip of the boat. The emotion there-in is, perhaps, exemplified by the voice’s memory of their mother. Perhaps, the mother used to slave-away during the holiday season making homemade pies, red potatoes and gravy, turkeys and hams, and a hundred other delicacies. The ‘thing,’ that is the gravy boat, thereby prompts an emotion in the reader—an emotion that could be a number of things. For me, I think of Thanksgiving (eh, in the spirit of) and the hours my mother spends in preparation. I imagine her fingers as she presses dough and marinates the turkey. My thoughts then drift to those associated with loss: perchance I lost my mother to disease; who, then, would be responsible for my well-being, my thanksgiving dinner, my source of affection, et cetera. It is increasingly obvious that the author meant not only to inform the reader of an experience in which she found her mother’s old gravy boat; rather, she seeks to inspire an emotion in me [the reader]—she seeks to remind me not to take the moments I have with the people I adore for granted.
In response to Kenyon Opposition: it disappoints me that anyone could read through any number of this woman’s poems without feeling any sort of sentiment or emotion. Her experiences, correlations, metaphors, words, all reek of inspiration. Perhaps a prerequisite for poetry reading would be an affecting heart.
On “Not Writing:” It seems that Kenyon has arrived at a literary stale-mate. For anyone who writes (even only on occasion) they are familiar with the feeling of a hardened hand. Perhaps Kenyon has taken a pause from her writer’s block to gaze out the window in front of her desk and catches a glimpse of the desperate wasp. Consequently, she associates the wasp’s inability to enter its home with her current inability to enter her home: pencil moving over paper.
Thus, she is inspired.
I am going to discuss “In the Nursing Home,” because I particularly enjoyed reading this poem. The first stanza really struck me. The language that it used to describe the person was phenomenal. “Like a horse grazing,” struck me at first in a sense where I did not know where she was going to continue with this analogy. But the grazing horse is on a pasture that keeps getting smaller until eventually it will be all gone. This idea of the horse grazing, just eating in a very calm and slow manner, really shows you the idea of the end of a life. To me, the “person” or thing making the fences smaller is death. Death is slowly creeping in on this person in the Nursing home. The nursing home brings to mind for me, thoughts of elderly people, very weak, and in essence dying, which is what this “horse” is doing as it grazes slowly to nothing. The horse analogy continues to emulate a person slowly distancing himself or herself from earth, and is not just going through the motions. Eating, drinking, and sleeping, but no longer “running wide loops/…[or] tight circles.” Slowly this person is dying, and the nursing home is the start of this path towards death. The horse represents a human, but why did Kenyon pick a horse? I believe it to be the free spirit of a horse as it runs free in the wild. The taming of such an animal is not right, especially for it to be confined to an ever-closing fence. In essence the taming and consolidation of a horse causes death just like this person. The ever closing fence is life and the nursing home, which is the final place for somebody before they die and go up to God. The horse’s free spirit will never be tamed though, because it will be forever lifted up in heaven once again after death. Nothing can confine the soul in heaven, and you get to spend the rest of eternity with the one you love and the one who loves you. Finally in the last stanza, Kenyon says “Master, come with your light,” which is referring to God. Kenyon is noticing that this person is in pain, or has lost the will to live anymore, so she is praying to God to take her away from the Earth into the light of heaven. She says, “Come and bring her in,” and she is saying to bring her into heaven. These last lines are remarkable, because they really show the death of the nursing home. The nursing home provokes the whole emotion of the poem. It is a poem of grieving for the decay of a life, but it is also a poem of hope, because bringing her towards the light of heaven is the best possible thing ever. To be up with the one who loves you forever is the best thing that anybody can ever want, and she is finally going to visit her creator. The nursing home is bringing people to God when they are at their worst, and although this is sad, it is hopeful for a better after-life.
ReplyDeleteThere were three poems in particular I found while reading Kenyon’s work to be especially full of emotion however, in the end, I chose “In and Out.” This poem is short, only 2 stanzas or six lines long but it packs a punch for sure. Most of the poems Kenyon writes seem to hold much more meaning if you have felt them yourself. I believe Jillian said this in class about Akhmatova, that her poems are like a secret letter to a friend; something that only that person knows. I think that Kenyon writes in very much the same way as this. Some poems I didn’t feel anything for, but those I had myself experienced became incredibly poignant. This is not meant to discount the understanding that some poems can evoke though. The understanding, however, is far less brilliant than the feeling or the reliving. The poem “In and Out” gives the impression that the man or woman in this poem is having one of those moments (though sometimes they are moments that last for years) where they can’t quite feel anything but tired and numb, where all they have is that tightness in their chest right before a sob bursts out only there are no sobs coming. The dog, the noisy klutzy dog, in this poem, keeps whoever is having this moment grounded. It is keeping this person from floating away from reality altogether or from moving faster and deeper into what awaits so readily in the depths of their head. The darkness that creeps gently to cast the persons thought into even greater despair. The dog, the unending love of this creature helps this person feel a sense of calm even if it is a crazed calm, a near maddening moment of hysteria being kept on the fringe. This person is focusing on the in and out breathe of their loyal companion, disregarding the sharp thuds of their own heart. This “sound of breathing,” as well as the warmth of that dog on their side, the dogs calm demure attitude flips that person right side up again. The dog in this poem is a life line in turbulent seas or a different perspective. The dog is the hand that takes off this persons despair goggles. The emotions evoked from this poem are very vivid. Kenyon knows where she wants to take the reader in this. Her vision then becomes ours even if the words they express are different. There is not only emotion in this poem but visual images and clues left by the author (I think.) For example, the person in this poem is upstairs. I visualize this person alone in their home and they have chosen the highest place in the house because the buoyancy of their thoughts will allow them to rest nowhere else. This person wants to be alone with themselves for a while, to feel what they have to feel until it subsides. They don’t want anyone to see them, but the searching dog finds them even though they don’t want to be found, and with its heavy body it brings them back and with its breath, its sigh it tells the person that it is here and that so is the person in the poem. With that sigh the dog gives the present of the present, of being in the here and now. This was the impression that I gathered from the poem though. In someone else’s eyes the meanings are most certainly different.
ReplyDeleteI must admit that the more of Kenyon’s poems I read, the more elementary and boring I felt they were becoming. The first few – simplicity is beauty – poems were interesting and intriguing, but I thought the everyday descriptions of everyday occurrences were progressively boring. I was able to grasp my close-minded and cynical interpretations of these poems after reading her motivation for writing her poem “coats.” If I had read this interview before reading her poems, my initial outlook on her writing may have been grounded in a deeper meaning, but I discovered that later.
ReplyDeleteIt is so true about Eliot’s “objective correlative,” though. Through reading these simple poems full of a variety of representations, all of us will inevitably feel a different emotion, remember a certain event, or even see something in a way we’ve never experienced. The poem that spoke to me the most was Evening Sun. The light Kenyon speaks of in the first stanza “forces” her back to her childhood. There are so many things in my life that seem to “force” me back to my childhood – a certain smell, a certain outfit, a certain picture. Her mention of the evening light and a summer dress immediately creates an image from my childhood, wearing a summer dress as the sun is setting along the horizon at my family’s old lake house in Wonder Lake, Illinois. Kenyon speaks to my heart in ways that I should more often do, remember that time in my life when things seem to be simpler, happier. These themes are represented so effortlessly in this poem. I can only assume that it was a common practice of many little girls who wore summer dresses to twirl and twirl until the skirt “made a perfect circle.” I know I did. In the second stanza, the simple description of the way she remembers the grass and trees and her outstretched arms is incredibly reminiscent of my childhood. I can almost smell the grass and remember its coldness on my bare feet. This objective correlative is in these representations – these simple images from her childhood. Like the coats that she saw that man carrying, nothing special, just a man carrying a coat. She saw something more; she felt something more and wrote about it. Not every girl can or will have this same reaction to a poem like this and it is the use of “ochre” and the mention of June that make it that much more real and understood.
The last stanza represents the sad but true reality that the little girl in me, as in Kenyon, must face after reverting to such a memory, “I would have to live on, and go on living.” We cannot keep twirling, soaking up the sunset or the smell of the grass and trees that are spinning around us forever. How I long to do this forever; Kenyon writes it well in “what sorrow burns but does not destroy my heart.” Although there is sorrow in no longer being that little girl in the summer dress, my heart still loves to remember that girl, that innocence.
The poem " Drawing from the Past" is a poem in which many emtions stirred through me. I think the underlying thee in this poem is sibling rivalry in a way. I think this is one of the strongest emotions ever, jealousy. The first stanza somewhat shows some forecoming when the author says, " on indifferent white bread." This tells me that the emphasis on the indifferent is strong in that the author seemed to attract power to white bread by ststing that it was indifferent. Kenyon sees no difference in either piece, the crust is the same, and the softness equal throughout both pieces. This brings the image of identical twins to my head which always deals with one doing better than the other. This further seems to prove my point about jealousy by stating in stanza two, " my older brother at school." It would be a normal line if their was something else in the stanza to present his deeds and doings, but Kenyon goes straight from his brother to the tomatoes that were richly red. Notice Kenyon puts no emphasis or detail on the older brother, but then goes on to describe a "tomato in depth and strategy. Another account of sibling rivalry and jealousy.
ReplyDeleteThe third stanza starts really bringing in the jealousy concept. The line, "I was alert to the joy of eating sandwiches alone with Mama," shows me that Kenyon is showing that she rather be alone with her mother. The word "alert" says that soething goes off in her head that says this is an important process in my life. She doesn't remember or account for when her whole family is together but just when she is alone with her mother. The sense for needed attention brings forth the sensation of being alone, unaccounted for, and not feeling needed or important. The fourth stanza didn't really do anything for me until I made my provisions on the last stanza, which creates in my mind the poem being out of order. The last stanza puts the finishing touches on my feeling of jealous emotion. The line, "My brother WAS good at it, and I was alert to that,too," brought mixed emotions to my head. Now at first I thought of the "WAS" as their is something I can't re-enact or become in life that my brother has accomplished. Therefore stealing all the glory and pride from her. She put alert in the last sentence in the same syntax as the third stanza. It is used to describe something great or very noticeable throughout your life. She wasn't slert to what he looked like or acted like but instead to what he accomplished that she couldn't. Another feeling was maybe remorse or missing his brother, but then that contradicts why he loves eating sandwiches alone with mother instead of with his brother also. That leads me to believe this poem was written in a jealous sense of mind.
I was disappointed in the majority of Kenyon’s poems. They seemed depressing and just made me not even want to read it. Every other poem had to do with someone dying and losing a loved one. I, myself, cannot relate to any of these subjects. I have not lost anyone special to my heart. Also, not only were her poems depressing, but I found them confusing to where I could not fully understand the image that she was trying to portray. For example, the poem “My Mother.” I thought the poem lacked emotion. It seemed as though the poem was just making a statement of what the mother did while she was downtown. It really did not provide enough imagery to help me convey the purpose of it, and it did not remind me of any emotion. I would say that the poem was quite boring. Though there were some poems that I did not like, I surprisly found one that evoked an emotion.
ReplyDeleteThe poem that I chose to write about is called “What Came to Me.” This poem evoked a memory of an ex boyfriend. When we first broke up, I found an old picture of us and immediately I broke down crying. On the day that I found it, I was cleaning up my room just because I was bored. Then buried deep down in an old shoe box I found the picture. All the memories just came rushing back; first date, kiss, and the first “I love you.” It all came rushing back, I thought I was over him and found myself missing him. On the back of the picture, with his writing it said, “The woman I will always love” ending with his signature, and at that moment I started to cry. Pain and anger entered my body, I loved him a lot, but hated him because of the reason we broke up. So this poem reminded of that moment.
Kenyon’s use of emotion in the first three lines caught my attention, and it immediately trigger and emotion. “I took the last dusty piece of china out of the barrel”. When she describes the piece of china as dusty, that makes me think that the china had not been used in awhile, and to be put in a barrel, I think that it was placed somewhere so it would not be found, so the memories would not come back. “It was your gravy boat, with a hard, brown drop of gravy still on the porcelain lip. I grieved for you then as I never had before.” The last few lines gives a good image of emotion. The hard gravy stain, makes the woman come back to reality to finally realize that the man she loves is not there. I can actually see the woman touching the gravy as he remises over the times they had dinner, until the memories become unbearable and she then breaks down. This relates to my story, of how a simple memory of someone can bring so much pain and unwanted memories that was never thought of and never want to think of again.
“Father and Son” was my favorite poem for a few reasons, one because it related to me the best out of all the poems, and because it provoked the most emotion of all the poems. The last few years I have helped me dad cut down trees for our fire place. The mental picture of the saws exhaust and letting the saw sit idle stick out in my head the most. When she described the son rolling the wood to the shed it reminded me of me and my brothers stacking the wood after we had cut and split the wood. Also the dust she talks about reminds me of standing and sawing wood and after it is all done being covered in dust from head to toe. I also connect with Jane Kenyon when she says she is pained by the noise of the chain saw.
ReplyDeletePain is the strongest emotion that comes out of this poem to me because cutting and chopping wood is not an easy job. When I was cutting with the saw the vibration from the saw fatigued the muscles in my arms and the weight of the saw also makes you sore. The noise, as mentioned in the poem, is also very painful for the ears not to mention it is also very annoying.
Happiness is another emotion that is provoked by this poem. Without putting in all this hard work in the summer and fall the people in this poem would not have been able to heat their house. Having a warm house makes me happy because I can sit in front of the fire place knowing I put in all this work to have this outcome. Happiness is also encountered when you are down cutting and splitting all the wood because you know you know longer have to do the job anymore.
The one thing that I really didn’t like about this poem and some of her other poems was that she would tell a story through her poems that would have one emotion and then at the end turn it around and threw the contradicting emotion in.
In this poem for me she had talked about how great the bond between father and son, being able to share this duty as a family. But at the end of this poem she describes how the back of the man “ached unrelentingly”, which for me took away from the idea of the father and son hanging out and turned to only the misery that came with the cutting of the wood.
I really enjoyed the way that the main image in the poem “Apple Dropping into Deep Early Snow” conveyed a sense of hopelessness and despair. In the poem, it is apparent that the narrator is suffering from serious emotional pain. Indeed, she even goes as far as wondering if she is one of the damned. Before she cries out to the Lord, she watches as a shriveled fruit falls from a branch and disappears into a deep drift of snow.
ReplyDeleteTo me, the lonely apple represents the narrator’s feeble grasp of her emotions and possibly her relationship with God. When the apple falls into the snow, to me it represents the narrator’s personal descent into misery.
I think the image works for a number of reasons. First of all, I think the metaphor implied by the image succeeds through its simplicity. It might not be particularly original to use a physical fall to represent an emotional one, but nonetheless, the image works. When I read the poem, the significance of the dropping apple was immediately clear to me, and I think that adds to the poem’s power. I find that sometimes when I have to ponder too much upon the meaning of a poem, the emotional punch of the language is lost by the time I decipher it.
Also, the visual aspects of the poem complement the power of its simplicity. In my opinion, winter provides an ideal backdrop for any kind of poem about misery. After all, though winter can be beautiful, its cold winds, lightless skies, and colorless fields of snow and ice set a good scene for sorrow. The apple itself, I felt, was also a good image for a number of reasons. First of all, we can get an idea of what the fruit has been through by examining its shriveled state. Perhaps once the apple was ripe and succulent, but harsh times obviously sapped it of its luster and left it dried and dead. We can draw a parallel between the fruit and the narrator in this sense. Perhaps the narrator was also once happy, but the poem reveals that she is obviously suffering from severe depression and hopelessness. Also, I liked the mental image of the apple clinging to the branch by a flimsy little stem. It made me think of the narrator’s own feeble efforts to hold on to her happiness or, perhaps, her religion. I think it’s fitting, as well, that the apple falls into a deep bank of snow. There would be no drama if it were to simply plop down and rest on the lawn. But because it disappears into uncertainty as it enters the snow, we are given a sense of a much more dismal descent.
I found it strange, however, that it was a jay that caused the fruit to fall. After all, I see that kind of bird more as a symbol of hope and happiness than I see it as being a bringer of gloom. Still, perhaps the actions of the jay are meant to show that even something small can trigger a lapse into sadness. It may even be true that I’m over-interpreting; it could be that the jay is just a jay and nothing more.
Overall, I enjoyed the poem despite its short length, and I thought its use of imagery was very well-done.
Although I wasn't too fond of Jane Kenyon's Akhmatova translations, there was something I really enjoyed about Otherwise. I couldn't quite pinpoint what I liked about these selected poems at first, but I knew there was something different about them than most poems I have read in the past. In the margins I wrote, “amazing observations,” “something I would never think about writing,” and “sometimes the smallest things evoke the most emotion.” Upon being given the prompt, I realized what I was trying to get at. Kenyon, undoubtedly, is a fond user of the objective correlative approach.
ReplyDeleteAccording to T.S. Eliot, an objective correlative is “a set of objects, a situation, a chain of events which shall be the formula for that particular emotion.” I think an objective correlative was visible in all of Kenyon's poems; she often wrote about nature or a specific place or object that made her feel a certain way. It seems that Kenyon had small epiphanies in each poem. I especially liked her poem “Having it Out with Melancholy.”
First, I should say why “Having it Out with Melancholy” is even considered to have an objective correlative. Well, indeed it is a chain of events, and an emotion is evoked at the end of the poem due to those preceding events. Assuming that this poem is written in the first person narrative, the very first happening of this poem is the birth of Kenyon. Although Kenyon cannot literally remember her birth, she can imagine what it must have been like. She obviously had a strange relationship with her mother ever since she could remember; she referred to herself as her mother's “anti-urge, / the mutilator of souls.” In a way, she blames her mother for her sadness in life, as shown in the third stanza: “You taught me to exist without gratitude. / You ruined my manners toward God: / “We're simply to wait for death; / the pleasures of earth are overrated.” Kenyon lived her life for many years thinking the pleasures of earth are, in fact, overrated.
In the second part of the poem, Kenyon is grown. She still hasn't shaken the troubles of her childhood, but rather suppresses it with anti-depressants. Happiness is far out of reach for Kenyon; she's desperately fighting against life. The anti-depressants apparently weren't working for her, until Nardil came along. Before Nardil, a monoamine oxidase inhibitor, she felt as if she had “drunk six cups of coffee” day in and day out. However, after taking Nardil she sees that “pharmacuetical wonders are at work.” For the first time in her life, she awakes with “ordinary contentment.” She couldn't help but wonder what had hurt her so terribly all her life until that moment.
I couldn't have been more pleased that this poem had a happy ending. I felt Kenyon's pain as she recalled traumatic events in her life. Depression and anxiety are demons to live with, and Kenyon was in constant search for a solution. Retrospection was of assistance to her search. After all those gloomy days, even stemming from birth, Kenyon finally finds some peace. In order to write this poem, she definitely found an objective correlative, the timeline of events leading to her epiphany. The pleasures of earth are no longer overrated. With this newfound appreciation of life, as seen in most of her poems in Otherwise, Kenyon found the ability to write about simple subjects that bring her happiness.
While reading the selected poems by Jane Kenyon, I found myself struggling to find a poem that evoked some kind of emotion. Even though there were few poems I read evoke an emotion, I felt the poem, “No”, evoked a deeper evoked emotion. Some people may feel this if a certain poem they read is relatable and may pull forth a memory the reader may remember about their life. The pasting of a loved one or friend is a hard time in a person’s life. We all know how it feels to lose a person who’s impacted our life in some way shape or form. The poem, “No” by Jane Kenyon evoked the emotion of sadness, grief, hurt, heartache, pain, distress, etc. The emotion was evoked as I read the first three lines.
ReplyDelete“With the last prayer being said it was time to turn away from the casket.” This is sad when an individual has to turn away and leave their loved one behind. From the first line you could tell they did not want to leave, as if they did not want the prayer to end. It hurts for someone to lose someone in their life they had a connection with. Someone who may have influenced your life in some way is no longer there to help you. Some people do not want to say goodbye and never attain closer. It was as if they needed an excuse to stay. I liked the second stanza: A noise that seemed not to be human; … more like the wind among leafless trees; the pausing of one hand on the car. The spirit of their loved one calling out to them and not wanting them to go can show a connection they hold between them. I liked that she put the poem in detail about the pausing of one hand on the roof of the car showing restraint and hesitation about leaving the cemetery.
When I read this poem, I thought about my grandmother. When my grandfather died, I can still remember the day of the funeral and how quite it was. Everyone was sad and the look on my grandmother’s face showed me how she was feeling, empty. The one man in her life she loved and cherished was no longer there for her. At the cemetery everyone gave their respects and as everyone was walking away from the grave my grandmother, parents, siblings, cousins, and I all looked back at the casket as if our mind was telling us we should leave, but our bodies wanted to stay there with him and not leave him there alone. By us standing there looking at the casket from a distance, it was like our final goodbye. My grandfather was my grandmother’s world. I do not think she wanted to give that up. As we were driving away I watched as the casket was being lowered, saying in my head, “goodbye granddad, I Love You.” This poem reminded me of this sad time in my family’s life.
The poem that I felt evoked emotion was the poem titled, “No.” This poem struck me the most because I can easily relate to the main point of the poem. The people are at a funeral and at any funeral there will be emotions flying all over the place. In the first stanza, it is easy to recognize the situation they are in and in even the first couple lines, the word usage and phrases used hit you with a sense of sadness. “The last prayer had been said, and it was time to turn away.” These first two lines had a major impact on me because I know when I was at the funerals for my grandma and grandpa, that very moment brought a waterfall of tears to my eyes. Thus these two lines start off the poem with a strong sense of emotion. I like how the author does not go into great detail, but just enough to make you think and relate to an experience you had at a funeral. In this case it is like the less said, the better because I know at any funeral no one wants to hear more than they want to hear.
ReplyDeleteIn the second stanza, I feel that the “coats” in this stanza are the leafless trees. The blowing wind on the leafless trees is an effect which shows the people at the funeral they are not alone, as if the spirit of the love one they had lost was not gone. Also I think the leafless tree symbolizes death because when a tree is full of exuberant leaves then it is obvious to the human eye it is alive and well. So being at a funeral with leafless trees, one from a distant could imagine the emotion the people are feeling while attending that funeral.
At the end of the second stanza leading into the third, the line, “I paused with one hand on the roof of the car,” easily shows the reader that one is obviously struggling with their loss and is having trouble accepting it. But when the next two lines are read and speak of the pitch from the wind going through the leafless trees and turning into a language tells the reader and the one in the poem that the spirit is has not left. Thus leaving one to think, has he/she really left? Or are we just imagining they are still here? The last three lines of the poem really end the poem with strong emotion. The dialogue the author chose for the wind’s language was perfectly correlated with the situation the people were in, that being a funeral. It not only strikes the ones in the poem but it also leaves the reader unsure because one could have possibly had an experience similar to that. I know I have when I lost my grandma that had lived with my family for eight years, and then passed away on my dad’s birthday. I will never forget that funeral because I was doing the same thing the individual was doing in this poem. Walking to the car in the season which trees were naked, with the wind whistling at my back, I knew it was her. Thus I stood there and just watched the trees sway in the wind..
In analyzing these poems after reading about Eliot’s objective correlative, I chose to write about “Drawing from the Past.” In describing her own poem “Coats,” Kenyon describes how one small detail in the situation, in this case the man’s coat and the woman’s coat he was holding, evoked emotions in her. Just that one particular image made her feel a certain way and know what happened without actually knowing the situation. I think in the same way Kenyon chooses to write about her past by focusing on a small detail. She uses this to elaborate on the situation, and then can elaborate on the feelings she had during and about her childhood. This poem struck me because I have used this to conjure up feelings about my own childhood. Often it stems from only being able to remember one small detail or image, but nonetheless this image allows me to build on feelings I may have had during this time. Right away I get a feeling from the first line. Just by using the word Mama instead of mom or mother or she, Kenyon injects some clue as to her relationship with and feeling toward her mother. Using Mama gives the emotion of a good, fun and lighthearted relationship. These feelings of happiness and lightheartedness continue through the first stanza when she describes the image of, “tomato sandwiches with sweeps of mayonnaise, on indifferent white bread.” Just the language alone gives me the feeling of a fun, easy going setting. She also chose to describe the white bread as indifferent, not a common description of bread. But in this context, I believe she is not using it to literally describe the bread, but instead describe the mood and feeling of this time. Similar choices are made in the third stanza, where again she uses Mama, and chooses to include the detail of bare feet. The bare feet again give the feeling of happiness, fun and carefree. In this stanza she is even more blunt describing that she was alert to the joy while eating the sandwiches, and this line reinforces my thoughts about her feeling and emotion throughout the first stanza. In the second stanza I get a clue on why she is in this situation and the feeling she has about it. Because her brother is away she is able to enjoy this picnic with her mom. But it is not until I connect this with the last stanza that I get an idea of how she feels about her brother. When she explains how she is not good at drawing and emphasizing that her brother was. I get a sense of jealousy and resentment. In the last sentence I can finally pull the whole story, the image and the emotion together. When I get the feeling of her jealousy followed by the line, “I was alert to that, too.” It gives me even more of a clue about her overall emotion toward the situation. She was aware that her brother was good at something she wasn’t and that she was jealous of him, probably in connection with some attention or recognition he got from their mother. I get the feeling that usually her brother and mother had a very good relationship and that she may have focused on him at the expense of neglect toward Kenyon. Because her brother was away, this allowed Kenyon and her mother to spend time together. Because Kenyon was aware of the joy and aware of the jealousy, this poem gives the emotion and tells the story of her feelings during her childhood, and about her relationship with her mother. Regardless of the usual jealous and feelings of neglect, Kenyon is happy at this time. The story and emotion is told through images and details of a specific moment in time, much like her poem “Coats.”
ReplyDeleteI was debating whether to use "In the Nursing Home" or "Coming Home at Twilight in Late Summer" as an example for an objective correlative. While the latter was a plain, literal example (as most of Kenyon’s poetry turns out to be), I felt that “In the Nursing Home” not only evokes stronger emotion out of the reader, but it is also more focused than some of her other poems. Based on the selections from Otherwise I have noticed that Kenyon’s poems tend to be very detailed, mostly focused on a single moment in time (“Main Street: Tilton, New Hampshire”, “What Came to Me”). I appreciate the detail because it often makes the descriptions interesting—for example, when describing a mother and child in “Main Street: Tilton, New Hampshire”, Kenyon notices: “…finally even the heel of the girl’s rubber flip-flop passed from sight”. However, the aspect of Kenyon’s poetry that I appreciate the most is her use of metaphor describing those details; as she says in “The Beaver Pool in December”: “…but now [the beavers] pass without effort, all through the chilly water; moving like thoughts in an unconflicted mind”. I felt that “In the Nursing Home” took one of those metaphors and expanded it, keeping me enchanted throughout the entire poem and therefore conveying her message more clearly and more creatively. This poem describes the resignation of an old woman in a nursing home, waiting for her time to die, as gently recognized by Kenyon. As Kenyon portrays it, the old woman has been whittling down for quite some time, and she has little left for her on earth. Kenyon compares the old woman to a horse—as very literally pointed out in the first line—and continues the metaphor throughout the poem. In this way, it is more focused on one feeling, as opposed to some of her poems such as “Falling”, which are more random.
ReplyDeleteAs Eliot described it, objective correlation is necessary in order for the writer or artist to convey the emotion successfully to the audience. With this in mind, Kenyon’s consistent use of the horse metaphor in the poem ensures that the audience is always aware that she is still talking about the old woman’s life coming to an end. We are all familiar with the feeling of resignation, no matter how acute, and could very well imagine it as feeling like fences squeezing in around us, cutting off our options. Similarly, we are also aware of the feeling of the old woman’s life closing in on her, that everything is turning bare and empty. In the line “She drops her head to feed; grass is dust, and the creekbed’s dry”, Kenyon reaches the peak of emotional tension with her metaphor, giving the reader the sense that all is lost for the old woman-horse. By ending the poem with a plea for salvation—a gentle reminder that the woman needs to be released from this emptiness—she leaves the reader without resolution; we are left like the old woman-horse, waiting for the end.
Jane Kenyon’s use of plain, simple vocabulary and diction are best put to use in the poem “In the Nursing Home.” This lack of linguistic and structural complexity help to portray the dire emotional emptiness that comes with being a patient in a nursing home and with the nursing home itself. Ironically, this emptiness evokes intense emotion in the person reading and imagining this scene.
ReplyDeleteThat her limited movement is caused by someone moving in the fences brings home the realization that this sick woman has not simply stopped moving by herself but has been forced to do so; she is, in effect, being held a prisoner. The dry creek and dusty grass add further depth to this despair and helplessness that comes from such imprisonment. This line does not just have to be read in the sense that she goes to feed but finds no food; it also can be read in the sense that even though there is no food, she tries to feed anyway. In other words, despite the sheer hopelessness, she still searches for hope. This entire image provokes anxiety in the reader. This woman’s entire life has been brushed off to the corner, leaving her unable even to fulfill her most basic needs of life.
I can see many reasons why Kenyon chose a horse to compare to the nursing home patient. First, it could have resulted from mere correlation between what she perceived to be similar situations: a being forced into strict captivity, stripped of all hope for future life. However, there is something to be said for why she chose in the first place to portray an animal instead of the direct image of the women herself. I think the reason for this is that many people who are still relatively young and carefree do not care too much to dwell upon death and dying people. If presented with the direct image of the woman herself, the emotions that were previously mentioned would have been disregard; old age is old age… However, give such a person the image of an animal, neglected and imprisoned, and these emotions flare up; an old person has lived their life, but an animal is always dependent and should be cared for. Consequently, comparing the old woman with an animal creates a much better correlation between the nursing home situation and the emotion of neglect and imprisonment.
The last two lines turn the poem’s hopelessness around, creating a sort of prayer. The only way to free this woman/horse from such unbearable desperation is to remove her from the situation. The image of a master bringing the horse in, ending the hopelessness, provokes incredible relief. By not directly referring to God, this feeling of relief can be first experienced by the reader outside of previously existing biases for or against God; yet, she also leaves the reader with a sense of hope for something afterwards.
Overall, Kenyon has taken a situation in which many younger people may have initially passed by without much thought; in comparing the situation to a horse in a pasture, she has created an objective correlative that succeeds in provoking intense emotion in the reader. These emotions consist of helplessness, hopelessness, desperation, and, finally, relief and mercy.