Sept 8 - 14 : Lowell and Behold...

Since I'm not entirely sure of what would be the most fabulous way to introduce my post, I'll just dive right in with little preamble.

Because this week's focus was mainly on Robert Lowell, I've been thinking quite a bit about his work and how exactly his poems are executed. That being said, I can’t decide whether or not Lowell’s style of confessional poetry strikes me in any way at all.

Don’t get me wrong—there are certain things that Lowell does very well. For example, at the end of “Water,” Lowell writes, “We wished our two souls/ might return like gulls/ to the rock. In the end,/ the water was too cold for us.” While not necessarily what one might consider terribly descriptive, the meaning is very clear. Lowell only uses what he needs to get his point across in this instance (the point being that, as much as you’d like to, you simply can’t return to how things once were), because anything else would take away from the lonely, slightly sad emotion of the poem.

However, the feeling in “Water” is there and then it’s gone for me. Lowell doesn’t provide me with any lasting images that I take away from the poem. When I first read it, I picked up on a slightly lonely, slightly depressed sort of persona, but other than that I couldn’t really tell you anything terribly earth shaking about the poem. Upon rereading it, I picked up elements from the working definition of confessional poetry that we’ve been using in class, but I still felt detached. After thinking about it, I concluded that this particular poem probably wasn’t written for me so much as it was for Lowell himself. I understand the necessity of such writing at certain times in life, but as a result I feel very Switzerland about “Water” at the end of the day.

“For the Union Dead” struck me, though, and left a lasting image. The difference being that the subject matter was something I could relate to more. Lowell isn’t trying to be the next Nathanial Hawthorne with his poem: he’s merely trying to be like hey guys, this is a bit of an issue, let me tell you about it in verse. In other words, Lowell still only uses the minimum amount of words he needs to relay his message, but his message is more universal: we’re tearing down memories to make way for “progress.”

When I was a kid, there was a big, open lot down the street where the neighborhood kids used to gather and play everyday after school. That lot became a house. Sure, it’s nice that there’s a house, but remember when we had a place to play?

Obviously that example is not as serious a subject as a national monument being torn down, but it’s based around the same idea that memories need to yield to “progress.” (I used quotations because a lot of times I don’t feel like progress is being made at all, which, I know, makes me bitter and un-American, but I’ve learned to deal with it.) I would venture to say that everyone can dredge up a memory that falls under the general theme I previously mentioned more concretely cementing the imagery for the reader.

Lowell’s poetry is, on the whole, really hit or miss for me. And since I’m being hit half the time (like with “For the Union Dead” and the other half is missing (like with “Water”), Lowell kind of neutralizes out in my head to an, “Oh yeah... I’ve read some of his things... They’re all right.”

Fin.

No armadillos were harmed in the running of this test...

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