One Art by Elizabeth Bishop - Essay Example

"One Art" by Elizabeth Bishop "One Art" speaks of irony: between the human effort to master or be skillful in meeting life's many downsides and the inevitability of fate which will always elude understanding. The poem by Elizabeth Bishop about loss of a loved one -- a very universal and personal theme - connoting of wild emotions breaking loose from grief, comes all the poignant with the poet's use of the a very structured form, the villanelle. The rhythmic flow of this poem mimics the human penchant for denial, stemming from intellectualizing a threat to one's personal equanimity, until the very last strand of control gives way to truth.

Overall, form and content merge naturally in this poem - embodying three elements which make for good poetry: structure, rhythm and voice/speaker. Structure. Bishop's "One Art" attests to the villanelle's (consisting of 5 tercets, 1 quatrain, with just two rhyme schemes) effectiveness as a form in containing painful thematic content. The limited rhyme scheme allowed Bishop to highlight the irony of word "master" with "disaster", "fluster" with master, and so on, until one notices that "disaster" wins out at the end of the poem.

The structure almost serves as a chant or prayer for the poem, with a line which always says that losing isn't hard to master or that losing something is no disaster, repeated all throughout the five tercets. The quatrain at the sixth stanza brings the prayer to a close, with acceptance (almost, yet still fighting for control - "Even losing you (the joking voice, a gesture)/ I shan't have lied. It's evident./ the art of losing's not too hard to master / though it though it may look like (Write it!) like disaster. "). More significantly, the quatrain signals the emotional breakdown that however comes with hope to overcome the loss - that is, by way of writing about it.

Rhythm. Rhythm more than any element in poetry establishes the connection between author and reader, a recognition based on the intuitive pulse for the movement of life. Rhythm or flow is what makes us say not merely "that's what it is" - but "that's how it is", establishing the authenticity of an emotional experience or feeling. "One Art" for all those who have lost a loved, with maybe guilt or carelessness in the mix, one will recognize how the pathetic attempts to stay the deluge of sorrow through rationalizations creeps towards the vacuum of lonely space, until the dam of grief breaks through, and healing starts ironically with the acceptance of loss.

The initial part of losing someone is suggested by the short clipped lines ("The art of losing isn't hard to master") and enjambment of lines - signaling the effort not to be overwhelmed or be touched. The motion of denial is exhausted until the last stanza when the speaker, coolly assured that even when "losing a continents and two rivers" did not really bother her all that much - is made undone by the recall of a "a joking voice". The rhythmic tension gets resolved with the last stanza, with the last line (though it may look like (Write it!) like disaster") with the repeat of the word "like", a painful attempt not to lose ground altogether and the imperative ("Write it!) encapsulating wild hope of a solution to the loss.

Voice/ Speaker A good poem like "One Art" makes sure that the voice in the poem speaks with clarity, or rather the reader sees him or her clearly. The feelings of which he or she speaks are simply recognizable (though may be unstated in the poem itself). The voice of "One Art is very clear on its emotions of loss, pathetic denials, and of course grief and hope - though Bishop mainly achieved this through the use of irony. Irony of the speaker in this case is especially effective in containing the painful theme of the poem without altogether losing control.