I will admit that when I first read Armantrout at the beginning of the year, I had no idea what was going on in the poem. I’m not especially good at interpreting the meaning of poems that are as abstract as hers. However, as I read the book, I began to understand what Armantrout was trying to do with her poetry, even if I didn’t fully understand the meaning behind them all.
For instance, on pages 93 and 94, the poem “Integer” sees a dramatic shift in tone. First it’s talking about darkness, then about how in metaphors “it kills the look-alike.” However, in the third section, she pretty much comes out and says that the parts of the poem before that don’t matter. This goes with the fact that after she discounts metaphors, she goes back on what she said. It matches the talk about darkness, because humans and some animals can’t see that well in darkness, if at all, and so things that are seen in darkness aren’t clear.
The meanings of her poems are often left up to reader interpretation, and there can be a lot of that. Her poems are loose in their prose, in a way, because even though you could say that it’s very deep, it’s not incredibly specific. What one person would see as an obvious metaphor for something wouldn’t be obvious at all to someone else. So, in a way, her poems are shrouded in the same darkness that she talks about in Integer.
I believe we are on the same page Joana. Armantrout is abstract and, when looking at her poems individually, has no form. Yet, when I look at Versed as a whole I could see somewhat of what Armantrout was trying to do. I still am not quite sure of exactly what Aramantrout was trying to produce. When looking at Versed in its wholeness I start to see a form develop.
ReplyDeleteAlso your analysis of "Integer" was very similar to mine. I could not but help finding herself contradicting almost everything she appeared to be saying. Aramantrout's poetry, I believe, is supposed to make the reader think and quite possibly question everything about it.