Coming in succession behind Armantrout, Levis, and Notley, Gluck’s poetry was almost painfully easy for me. Unlike the other poets (Merwin excepted, sort of), Gluck hands her readers the meaning and tell them to do something with it. Notley invited readers to experience meaning alongside Alette, Levis dares readers to unpack his collages and make something of them, Armantrout hands the reader a puzzle to play with and create meaning and even Merwin (who is more straightforward) gives readers a sense of meaning and an idea and lets them decide what it means to them individually. Gluck tells us what she means.
In “Matins” (25), the speaker is again in the garden, an obvious Edenic motif that runs throughout the book, but this time is not planting but “pretending/ to be weeding.” The speaker then proceeds to describe everything she does in her garden in the morning (matins), all of which has a clear metaphor, which she even tells us: “I’m looking for courage, for some evidence/ my life will change.” The “symbolic leaf” she is thinking of pulling cannot be anything other than a sign, which has the convenient synonyms: evidence, symbol, assurance, mark, proof, etc. Well, if we weren’t sure before that one of her main themes is understanding of self and life, we know now that it is. It is also completely clear that the “you” the speaker is talking to is both us, the readers, and God, who appears in nearly every other poem as a definitive otherworldly all-powerful being. If there is another all-powerful creator of earth and life and humanity other than the Christian God, I apologize, but it is abundantly clear that this is the “you” she means. Her reversal of meaning at the end comes in the form of a question: “Or was the point always/ to continue without a sign?” This last sentence tells us two things. First, that the previous interpretation of assurance that her life can change (presumably for the better) in the garden (Eden) where she talks to god is correct and second, that her questioning and our questioning that such a thing can or does exist is valid, and that this is what the poem wants us to think about.
Ultimately Gluck’s poetry functions as an intimate view into the speaker’s (ahem, her) spiritual journey and mindset while exploring God and faith in the rural Vermontian landscape she paints for us. We are simply watching instead of experiencing or sharing. I think this still gives meaning to the reader, but in a me: teacher, you: student sort of way that wasn’t present in any other poet we’ve read so far.
I thoroughly enjoyed your blog entry, Kelsey, but I'm afraid I don't agree with one of your major points.
ReplyDeleteI don't think we are totally removed from the poetic situation--as you assert in your final paragraph--in much of Gluck's poetry. I think Gluck's ease of use (compared to many of the other poets we've read) contributes an invitational quality to her poetry. Yes, we are witnessing her continual faith into doubt conundrum, but her easily-relatable style serves to transport the reader to the problem rather than be a self-serving lamentation of a continual loss of faith. I find this in her imagery. Gluck has a way with simple, relatable imagery that not only conveys images but also mood. Take for example four lines in the poem on page 25 that you quoted from: "...and soon the summer is ending, already / the leaves turning, always the sick trees / going first, the dying turning / brilliant yellow..." The image here of fall foliage gives that sense of heightened anxiety that fall seems to instill in New Englanders because it foretells the coming of winter. Winter, also, is a certain seasonal "death" for many species. Gluck mirrors this in the line "the dying turning / brilliant yellow" this gives one the idea of a deathbed conversion and also a sense of Gluck's anxiety over her questioning of faith. In this sense, I think Gluck's poetry is that in which the reader is constantly experiencing and sharing because of its very real accessibility.