Katrina Metty

Ms. Johnson

CIS Lit & Comp

11 January 2010

Bold and Brash

          For Mary Oliver, “it is simply not enough. . . to notice things; one must know, weigh, account for one’s experience” (Boruch 132).  This idea leads to her demise in American Primitive as she takes her poems too far by giving the reader the answer to a puzzle and not letting them try for themselves.  Poetry is meant to make the reader think, wondering what the author was talking about or what they meant.  Instead, she leads the reader through explanation within her work, or flatly states a meaning.  By doing so, her poems read as though she’s talking, taking the musicality out of them.  Another downfall seen in Oliver’s writing is intensive use of personification.  All add up to drop Mary Oliver from being an exceptional poet to a mediocre one.

          Often, Oliver’s poems reflect on nature or other people.  She allows the reader to conjure a beautiful image of an egret on the water, or a solitary person in an empty hospital room.  “John Chapman” starts much the same way, describing an Indian man who planted trees, but she doesn’t stop with that.  Instead of letting the reader figure out what the morale of her poem was, she tells them:

“Whatever

the secret, and the pain,

there’s a decision: to die,

or to live, to go on

caring about something” (27-31).

No longer is the meaning of this poem up for debate.  Mary Oliver directly wrote that it was about the will to live.  “This is a weakness, more or less, [:] . . . her desire to lift things into significance” (Boruch 133).  In her wish to make the reader understand, Oliver clarifies any confusion the reader may have by telling them what she’s ruminating.  While this is not always the case, it happens often enough to be considered a trend in her writing.  Another example of this phenomenon is seen in “The Fish” where Oliver relays to the reader that she wants them to understand what eating the fish meant.  The act entwines her with the sea, feeding into the cycle of life and death.

          Sometimes, Oliver takes this explanation a step farther; it’s as if she says, “here is the story. . . and here is the meaning.  Here the body, here the soul” (Boruch 132).  What used to flow through the poem instead has been reduced to a statement, as in “Skunk Cabbage” where she ends with “what blazes the trail is not necessarily pretty” (27).  There is no longer anything left for the reader to analyze, for Mary Oliver has stated what her poem signifies.  Another great example of this self-explanation comes in “The Kitten” when Oliver describes an act of selflessness, ending with “I think I did right to go out alone / and give it back peacefully” (20-21).  Just in case the reader may have thought she was questioning her motives for doing so, Mary Oliver throws that last thought in to quell any second thoughts.  These short statements contribute to the lack of lyrical voice seen in some of her poems.

          A large reason many of Oliver’s poems are nonchalant is that they are structured to read like thoughts.  In “Music”, she begins a stanza with “I can’t remember / where this happened but I think / it was late summer” (16-18).  This tone takes away what a poem is supposed to consist of: a song-like flow that gives the reader a taste of an idea which they are then supposed to figure out the rest on their own.  Mary Oliver wrote a whole poem in this manner titled “The Kitten”.  Reading it makes one feel as though she’s telling them a story about a stillborn kitten that she buried ending with Oliver’s characteristic self-analysis.  While this poem did contain an animal, it didn’t include her other unique element of personification.

          Normally, literary techniques can take a written work to the next level in terms of expertise.  However, Mary Oliver uses them too intensely: she has a “stubborn near personification of natural life” (Boruch 134) in which she goes beyond the adequate usage.  In “In the Pinewoods, Crows and Owl”, Oliver addresses the owl as if it is a long-time friend, talking about the enemy crows as if they are humans as well:

          “You

          will have a slow life, and eat them, one by one.

          They know it.  They hate you.  Still

          when one of them spies you out, all stream

          straight toward violence and confrontation” (23-27).

This technique was not consistent throughout the entire poem, existing only in the second half.  This idea could have been used to make it wonderful, but instead she uses it in a way that makes the personification seem out of place.  Other times, Mary Oliver tries to make the reader become friends with nature as she describes moles taking long lonely walks, the sun’s tenderness on her neck and shoulders, and egrets having faith in the world (Boruch 134).  This discomforting feeling fails to capture the reader in the moment she’s experiencing, therefore pushing them away.

          Mary Oliver is overall an average poet.  Her affable style takes away from her professionalism; she doesn’t always know when to end her thoughts, continuing to include explanations of what she wants the reader to understand.  Oliver excessively self-analyzes her poetry, has a voice that speaks instead of sings, and uses personification too harshly, bringing down her potential as a poet to be among the ranks of high school students.

Works Cited

Boruch, Marianne. “Oracular Fever.” The Iowa Review 15.1 (1985): 131-135. JSTOR. Web. 2 Dec. 2009. <http://www.jstor.org/‌stable/‌20156162>.

Oliver, Mary. American Primitive. New York Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1983. Print.