Poetry and Poetics–Lit 204

“We Real Cool” by Gwendolyn Brooks is a short, simple poem about a group of rebellious teenagers hanging out and playing pool at some place called the Golden Shovel. The lines, in my opinion, illustrate an idea of each teenager saying each line in a circle. The poem has no real speaker, as it just subtitled the “pool players”. There’s 8 total lines and 8 total sentences starting with ‘we’, and only 7 teenagers, so perhaps Brooks intended for the readers to visualize all seven of them saying “we / die soon” (7-8) at the end. 

It’s hard to predict whether this poem is an appreciation, warning, or criticism for rebellious behavior. The teenagers leave school early, stay out late, throw punches, promote bad behavior, drink alcohol,  and listen to jazz– all pretty stereotypical young, delinquent behavior. This poem is easy to write up as a criticism for this behavior due to the final line and its implication that it results in an early death; however, given the historical context of the situation, I might argue that the poem is simultaneously a pessimistic and appreciative poem. 

Brooks wrote this poem in the height of the Civil Rights Movement, a movement that would not have occured if not for those who “strike straight” (4) and “sing sin” (5), so it’s necessary for the world to progress and change. And yet, Brooks also knows that engaging in that behavior in this time period is certainly a death sentence, whether it’s literally or figuratively. She might argue that some people have to engage in rebellion despite the sacrifice, and so she encourages people to keep making a stand, but to be careful.  

This poem is a mystery. At a first glance, it’s vague and shallow. It paints a singular picture in a singular sentence: a rained-on red wheelbarrow sitting next to some white chickens. But the opening line, “so much depends / upon” is the true brain boggler. What exactly depends upon this image that Williams is illustrating? And what exactly does the red wheelbarrow next to chickens mean? What part do we focus on? The color red? The rain water? Or the whiteness of the chickens? Does the ominous subject of the poem depend upon this image under the condition that each of these factors exists, or would it change if the wheelbarrow was blue or if it was sunny outside or it was beside some cows?

From my interpretation, I can’t decide whether this poem is about the societal dependency of every-day, previously unnoticed objects, or if it’s a broader appreciation of agriculture and its impact on human civilization. The former would mean that the wheelbarrow is merely an example of an object that people take for granted and the key emphasis of the poem is on the simplicity. On the other hand, the latter would indicate that the image itself is the important part because of the references to agriculture and farming as a whole. The poem could be an appreciation of the fact that humanity was and is only able to progress because of the invention and innovation of farming. So, the “so much depends / upon” is really just so much– progress, technology, love, creativity, leisure, safety. All of these things depend on the reliability of the rainy red wheelbarrow sitting by some chickens. 

At first glance, Hopkins’s sonnet is merely a verbal dump of his own depressing feelings; however, in my interpretation, Hopkins is attempting to teach a pessimistic lesson to humanity. 

In accordance with the structure of the Petrarchan sonnet, the poem takes a turn between the octave and the sestet. In the octave, Hopkins portrays his own feelings of unavoidable and intense despair while calling out for figures like Mary, God, and “Fury” (7) to help. The poem continues with the same tone through the sestet, but shifts into a commentary on society. He argues that people experience immense amount of pain by metaphorically comparing the mind to a range of mountains with never ending cliffs we are just constantly hanging off of, and our “Durance” (12) can’t handle those anguishes. In the last two lines, “Wretch, under a comfort serves in a whirlwind: all / Life death does end and each day dies with sleep”, Hopkins makes his last argument– society cannot function without the comfort of mortality and termination. We survive because we know eventually we will die. 

This poem is morbid and hard to read, not just because of the empathy we as readers feel for the hopelessness and despair that Hopkins illustrates, but for the existentialist viewpoint that nothing matters because we all just work to die and there is no greater purpose in life. Additionally, it’s hard to come to terms with the fact that Hopkins frames this as a form of comfort– that life is so depressing that we should be grateful that it ends; rather than scared of it.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                           

John Donne, in his Holy Sonnet #10 “Death, be not proud”, explores the power and limits of a conscious, devious character called Death, as if it were an entirely separate entity than the mere experience of death. Using apostrophe as his primary figurative language device., Donne argues that both the faith and willpower of humanity and the inevitability of death are stronger than personified Death. Since this poem originates from the set of sonnets that Donne uses to establish and question his relationship with God and Christianity, it is highly likely that this poem addresses the paradoxical relationship between Christ and Death. Specifically, it addresses the moral idea that Christ’s ultimate sacrifice implies the impotence of Death himself. Donne writes, “Thou art slave to fate, chance, kings, and desperate men” (Line 9). The examples of various beings that could overpower Death shows Donne’s point that Death is weaker than it seems. In addition, in lines 10-11, Donne justifies the statement from the line before by exemplifying the ways in which death is stronger than Death: “And dost with poison, war, and sickness dwell / And poppy or charms can make us sleep as well”. At this point in the poem, Donne sums up his general accusation in line 9 with examples of all the ways that each of those beings is more powerful than Death. He associates “poison, war, and sickness” (10) with the idea of humanity’s own fate and destiny destroying itself rather than being actively manipulated or controlled by Death. Likewise, his conceits to Christ’s sacrifice and resurrection imply the indubitable power of kings, and the idea of “poppy and charms can make us sleep as well” is a suggestion that desperate men committing suicide is a defeat of Death, as well. 

I thoroughly enjoy this poem because I generally love apostrophes and pieces of work that address things that cannot actually understand and probably don’t exist. For example, immediately upon finishing this poem I thought of The Book Thief by Markus Zusak. In his novel, ‘Death’ narrates a solemn and fascinating story of different people throughout World War II. Compared to the poem, however, Death is portrayed as an omniscient, unwavering, and unstoppable force of fate that is God, death, and life all in one; he is the reason for everything.

Given these two extremely different ideas of the power and control that Death has over humanity, it brings up a relatively interesting discussion question: 

If Death were a conscious entity, would it be “a slave” to humanity? Or would it be entirely omniscient and formidable? Are the forces that humanity plays in its own downfall a sign of Death’s impotence or his power?