.JPG)
After a five - day cold
I almost forgot how to run:
slapping my feet on the wet beach
like an obligation,
watching the birds, smiling at girls
like, “yeah, I enjoy this” –
But really I was just remembering
that I used to.
“This ground feels clammy,”
“Do we have to make it out to the
point today?” and “Oh god, then
there's the run back,”
I was ignoring
myself say.
Then the sun went down,
And the birds were hard to see,
And the rocks were sneaking
up under feet like kids
who'd jump on
my back
if I lay down.
“Wake up, Josh!” So
I skipped home high
… for no one
was a-
round
.
*Thanks David (land) & Julie P. (moon) for making this collage full.
ReplyDeleteTo me, this poem identifies how people are volatile by nature. We are always changing, whether in appearance, interests, or in this case, conventions. What we do and how we do it, are actions that continuously change as we grow and learn. What we used to do may even seem so strange to us now. Like waking up from a dream and only realizing how strange the dream was once we woke up from it. Which is what the realization seems to be for the speaker in the last stanza when it says "Wake Up, Josh!", so he begins to skip, instead of the usual routine of running. These moments of realization only come from events that make us "wake up", so a period where we do not partake in the usual routine, such as the speaker's five day illness. The speaker seems to change in convention in only five days, which again shows the fluctuating nature of people. Maybe later the speaker shall stride down the beach instead of skip.
ReplyDeleteIt's also often easier to be yourself -- skipping, as silly as it may look, is a superiorly fun way of commuting, for e.g. -- when no one is looking at you.
DeleteAt least at the start of a habit of sincerity.
First the speaker experiences a liberation from his sickness (becoming physically reinvigorated after a 5 day long cold which we all know is completely terrible) allowing him to once again enjoy the pleasures of running on the beach with a full feeling of wellness. But then doubt creeps in, maring the speaker's state of enjoyment. The speaker says (referring to running on the beach) “ ‘yeah i enjoy this’/ But I really was just remembering/ that I used to.” The wet ground becomes “clammy” like nervous hands and fears or dreads about completing the run weigh on the speaker's mind. Then, presumably after a nap or some hiatus in running, the sun goes down and everyone else on the beach is gone, leaving the speaker alone with himself. Now we can see a clear connection between the physical weight the cold had put on the speaker’s body and the emotional weight of the fear of judgement placed on the speaker’s mind. Liberated from the latter, the speaker begins skipping joyously as an expression of individuality. This poem begs, “Be yourself, even when being judged by others, trust me it will feel like kicking a bad cold.”
ReplyDeleteReading this poem as it starts of with its physical spaces and disjointedness reminding of the awkwardness of returning to a physical activity that was once so smooth, I feel peace in the lightness of exercise and moving for joy. In the middle of my swim season my freshman year, I suffered from a spontaneous pneumothorax in which my left lung collapsed. I went from swimming at least six two hour practices a week to laying in a hospital bed for two weeks. I wasn’t able to do anything beyond a mild walk for three months, and when I returned to swimming it felt like starting from square one because breathing was just a mess. But as I moved away from competitive swimming, I remembered that why I kept coming back to the pool as a little girl wasn’t for beating the guy next to me or for being good at something. Like as you found in the end that skipping was your way away from the gaze of others and that the action was simply enough compared to the immobility of the cold, I found my old love of being in the water. Feeling the silky water enveloping me as I broke the surface, gliding as my body streamlines off the wall, moving my legs to produce beauty in my stroke. It isn’t about the looks, its about the feel. The wellness of being alive and moving.
ReplyDeleteThis poem initially stands out to me because of its unique visual appearance. Since there are gaps between the words in the lines, I have to read the poem slowly. Then, as the poem goes on the gaps become smaller. I believe that this forced reading speed of the poem represents the speaker in the poem getting back in the rhythm of running. Is that the poet’s intentions or is the lessening of gaps between words as the poem goes on a representation of the speaker’s wellness, which connects better with the title of the poem? Either way, I find this visual structure adding an important layer of depth to the poem. I find the illustration that goes along with the poem very ambiguous. I believe that the illustration is of an extremely steep ocean wave and to me this connects to the wave of reactions to running the speaker in the poem has after being sick. I am a little confused by the content of this poem. I understand the storyline of the first two stanzas, the speaker has just returned to running after being sick and feels out of shape. However, I am confused by how the last two stanzas relate to the first two stanzas. I view the sun going down in the poem as the speaker’s start of referring to his surroundings more metaphorically. Then, I believe that there is a turning point at the end of the poem when the speaker begins to return home because the act of skipping is joyful and choosing not to care is freeing.
ReplyDeleteA little bit of fear got him to move. That's the emotional shift in the last two stanzas, once the sun sets and other people drain from the beach.
DeleteEasy lives are tempting to take for granted.
Once we're a little worried about our safety, our stake in our *one* *precious* life perks up. As if by magic :)