Walcott Poem
June 14, 2011 8:58 AM
Could you help me understand a poem? "Frederiksted, Dusk" by Derek Walcott.
I understand and like enough of this short poem to want push through, but am having trouble understanding what's going on after the first few lines.
An online text of the poem is here.
Some things that confuse me:
-Why is there a comma after "their collective will"? Isn't that phrase the subject of the verb "would shine" which follows?
-"waited too in" on the second-last line: I'm thrown back by this construction.
-What does the girl who suntans on a rock experience or represent?
I understand and like enough of this short poem to want push through, but am having trouble understanding what's going on after the first few lines.
An online text of the poem is here.
Some things that confuse me:
-Why is there a comma after "their collective will"? Isn't that phrase the subject of the verb "would shine" which follows?
-"waited too in" on the second-last line: I'm thrown back by this construction.
-What does the girl who suntans on a rock experience or represent?
I get the sense that he's talking about a bunch of old guys for whom the only bright spot in their day was watching the sunset, and part of why it was the only bright spot in their day was because they all hadn't had the will or spunk to be bothered to have anything more going on for themselves. All they really felt like doing any more was just sitting around shooting the shit, and then when the sunset came, they all watch it because it's pretty, but when it comes to try doing anything more ambitious, they're all "meh."
-Why is there a comma after "their collective will"? Isn't that phrase the subject of the verb "would shine" which follows?
Here's the full sentence, written out as prose:
Whatever it is that leaves bright flesh like sand and turns it chill, not age alone, they were old, but a state made possible by their collective will, would shine in them like something between life and death, our two concrete simplicities, and waited too in, seeming not to wait, substantial light and insubstantial stone.
I would paraphrase that sentence as: "They were old, but not just in calendar years, they were old because they couldn't be bothered to not act old -- something in them had just given up, and it was when they were watching the sunset that you could sort of sense what made them give up on life like that." The "would shine" is referring to "whatever it is that leaves bright flesh like sand and turns it chill." Basically it's -- "whatever it is that made them give up on life -- not this, and not that either -- would shine in them..."
-What does the girl who suntans on a rock experience or represent?
People who suntan also tend to act as lazy as these old guys do. That's all.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 9:12 AM on June 14, 2011
-Why is there a comma after "their collective will"? Isn't that phrase the subject of the verb "would shine" which follows?
Here's the full sentence, written out as prose:
Whatever it is that leaves bright flesh like sand and turns it chill, not age alone, they were old, but a state made possible by their collective will, would shine in them like something between life and death, our two concrete simplicities, and waited too in, seeming not to wait, substantial light and insubstantial stone.
I would paraphrase that sentence as: "They were old, but not just in calendar years, they were old because they couldn't be bothered to not act old -- something in them had just given up, and it was when they were watching the sunset that you could sort of sense what made them give up on life like that." The "would shine" is referring to "whatever it is that leaves bright flesh like sand and turns it chill." Basically it's -- "whatever it is that made them give up on life -- not this, and not that either -- would shine in them..."
-What does the girl who suntans on a rock experience or represent?
People who suntan also tend to act as lazy as these old guys do. That's all.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 9:12 AM on June 14, 2011
and waited too in, seeming not to wait,
substantial light and insubstantial stone.
The comma after "too in" seems misplaced to me.
I think it reads better as:
and waited too, in seeming not to wait,
substantial light and insubstantial stone.
posted by jamjam at 9:40 AM on June 14, 2011
substantial light and insubstantial stone.
The comma after "too in" seems misplaced to me.
I think it reads better as:
and waited too, in seeming not to wait,
substantial light and insubstantial stone.
posted by jamjam at 9:40 AM on June 14, 2011
i think the comma after "too in" is necessary, if you take it out it changes the play between the two "insubstantial"s - "in...substantial light" "insubstantial stone".
posted by facetious at 9:46 AM on June 14, 2011
posted by facetious at 9:46 AM on June 14, 2011
and waited too, in seeming not to wait,
substantial light and insubstantial stone.
Nope. The "seeming not to wait" is an insertion into "and waited too in substantial light." It doesn't make sense if you sever the "in."
posted by Sys Rq at 9:47 AM on June 14, 2011
substantial light and insubstantial stone.
Nope. The "seeming not to wait" is an insertion into "and waited too in substantial light." It doesn't make sense if you sever the "in."
posted by Sys Rq at 9:47 AM on June 14, 2011
(And, to address the OPs question, "waited too in" is just an awward way of saying "also waited in.")
posted by Sys Rq at 9:48 AM on June 14, 2011
posted by Sys Rq at 9:48 AM on June 14, 2011
Ian Lancashire of the University of Toronto has placed his interpretation online here. I don't agree with all he says, but there are interesting points and insights.
posted by likeso at 9:56 AM on June 14, 2011
posted by likeso at 9:56 AM on June 14, 2011
It's hard to tell you what something in a poem represents. What it meant to the author is not likely to be the same as what it will mean to person A, B or C.
To me, a stone can drink the sun, becoming far hotter than the surroundings and retaining that heat after the sun has set. The girl, like the stone, is drinking the heat and becoming alive and beautiful (warm & tan). Just like the stone that'll get cold after the sun sets, she'll get old and not beautiful, similar to the old men. The poem moves on, but that was the place my mind went.
People have explained the punctuation sufficiently, but a poem must not always follow proper grammar. It can do whatever it wants, though the harder it is to parse, the more you'll get questions like this or just grumbling and they'll stop reading.
posted by OnTheLastCastle at 10:00 AM on June 14, 2011
To me, a stone can drink the sun, becoming far hotter than the surroundings and retaining that heat after the sun has set. The girl, like the stone, is drinking the heat and becoming alive and beautiful (warm & tan). Just like the stone that'll get cold after the sun sets, she'll get old and not beautiful, similar to the old men. The poem moves on, but that was the place my mind went.
People have explained the punctuation sufficiently, but a poem must not always follow proper grammar. It can do whatever it wants, though the harder it is to parse, the more you'll get questions like this or just grumbling and they'll stop reading.
posted by OnTheLastCastle at 10:00 AM on June 14, 2011
-What does the girl who suntans on a rock experience or represent?
In this poem Walcott metaphorically identifies at least four things, in order of first appearance: the filling and emptying of glass vessels, the waxing and waning of the light of the sun in the course of a day, the diminishment of life force with age, and the rhythm of the tide on a (west facing) beach.
The ruling images are filling and emptying, the identification of light, life force, and tidal water, and the conceit that the sun sucks the light out of the world just as the ocean draws the water back from the land as the tide ebbs.
The girl is filled with the sunlight of life force which is (almost) at ebb in the men looking into the sun, which is sucking it back out of them as the ocean reclaims the water from the sand of the beach.
posted by jamjam at 10:15 AM on June 14, 2011
In this poem Walcott metaphorically identifies at least four things, in order of first appearance: the filling and emptying of glass vessels, the waxing and waning of the light of the sun in the course of a day, the diminishment of life force with age, and the rhythm of the tide on a (west facing) beach.
The ruling images are filling and emptying, the identification of light, life force, and tidal water, and the conceit that the sun sucks the light out of the world just as the ocean draws the water back from the land as the tide ebbs.
The girl is filled with the sunlight of life force which is (almost) at ebb in the men looking into the sun, which is sucking it back out of them as the ocean reclaims the water from the sand of the beach.
posted by jamjam at 10:15 AM on June 14, 2011
All interesting comments (and well-put), thank you. I guess jamjam's last comment (building on OnTheLastCastle's) seems the most appealing to me--but whether it reads best back into the poem's words, as opposed to, say, EmpressCallipygos', I don't know.
One specific thing I have trouble getting my mind around, though, in EmpressCallipygos and PhoBWanKenobi's interpretations is that it seems strangely inappropriate to use the verb 'shine' regarding 'whatever it is that made them give up on life'--shining doesn't seem like a figure of speech you'd use to represent a bleak quality revealing itself.
posted by Paquda at 2:34 PM on June 14, 2011
One specific thing I have trouble getting my mind around, though, in EmpressCallipygos and PhoBWanKenobi's interpretations is that it seems strangely inappropriate to use the verb 'shine' regarding 'whatever it is that made them give up on life'--shining doesn't seem like a figure of speech you'd use to represent a bleak quality revealing itself.
posted by Paquda at 2:34 PM on June 14, 2011
I haven't read this in a long time. I will revisit Walcott, so thank you.
My take:
1. Why comma after "their collective will"
If you mentally "hear" the phrase "not age alone, they were old" in parentheses, you might feel better about the comma. I myself thinks it's brilliantly placed.
2. Confusing construction: "Waited too in"
Do the same thing: turn "seeming not to wait" into a parenthetical and see how it feels.
3. Meaning of girl tanning on rock
I think he's saying that the old men "like empties" as one are fearless in the face of, and also filled with, this most fundamental truth, that the light of the rising evening -- mortality -- brings the same kind of illumination from within as carefree beauty in youth.
posted by thinkpiece at 3:54 PM on June 14, 2011
My take:
1. Why comma after "their collective will"
If you mentally "hear" the phrase "not age alone, they were old" in parentheses, you might feel better about the comma. I myself thinks it's brilliantly placed.
2. Confusing construction: "Waited too in"
Do the same thing: turn "seeming not to wait" into a parenthetical and see how it feels.
3. Meaning of girl tanning on rock
I think he's saying that the old men "like empties" as one are fearless in the face of, and also filled with, this most fundamental truth, that the light of the rising evening -- mortality -- brings the same kind of illumination from within as carefree beauty in youth.
posted by thinkpiece at 3:54 PM on June 14, 2011
This poem is about aging:
like something between life
and death, our two concrete simplicities,
Life and Death are our "two concrete simplicities". Anyway, that is where I would begin with the poem, from there you can begin a number of paths --
take the ending for example, Why is stone insubstantial? Keep in mind the number of times stone is brought up, "least stone in Frederiksted", "rock", "concrete" (although he uses it in a different since, it becomes a great quibble with the noun -- indeed feel how beautiful it is for the noun to reach out into the metaphorical within the word "concrete". The same can be done for light, poems like this you need to spend time on, Q&A can help but discussion, possible readings, glosses, paraphrases, are more effective tools in my opinion.
posted by Shit Parade at 4:02 PM on June 14, 2011
like something between life
and death, our two concrete simplicities,
Life and Death are our "two concrete simplicities". Anyway, that is where I would begin with the poem, from there you can begin a number of paths --
take the ending for example, Why is stone insubstantial? Keep in mind the number of times stone is brought up, "least stone in Frederiksted", "rock", "concrete" (although he uses it in a different since, it becomes a great quibble with the noun -- indeed feel how beautiful it is for the noun to reach out into the metaphorical within the word "concrete". The same can be done for light, poems like this you need to spend time on, Q&A can help but discussion, possible readings, glosses, paraphrases, are more effective tools in my opinion.
posted by Shit Parade at 4:02 PM on June 14, 2011
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posted by PhoBWanKenobi at 9:05 AM on June 14, 2011