Thread: Upon Reading Salinger

Upon Reading Salinger

i've never read salinger (i know, i know, just never got around to it) so i may be taking this out of context. this poem has a dreamlike quality, falling into the storm, weightlessnes, etc. it felt like a refuge "i think of art", i like the connect i found in the spinning of the fan and the turning of the clock, a feeling of outside of time and place. great sensations in this.

a question though, the repetition of the lines "i think of art" and "holes and trenches", i wonder what perpose these serve. great poem, enjoyed it very much.

wood

Thank you for the comments. I wanted to draw attention between the difference of art and the digging. The contrast of normal life and artistic life. That was my only reasoning for the repetition.

Glass, reading your explaination to wood helped me get a better grip on your poem. I love the following and wonder if the first stanza relates to the "norm" life and the second the "artistic" life? I really like how you broke up "maelstrom" from "shapes" A very unique technique. Loved the poem as a whole! Laurie

The shapes outside were wooden;
the air was dry.
But inside the maelstrom

shapes go by, clockwise,
like the blur of a fan. There is a faint
beating, like a heart –
slight pulsing.