The Theme of Internal Struggle and Meditation in Modern Poetry - Essay Example

The theme of internal struggle and meditation in two great works of modern poetry, The Road Not Taken by Robert Lee Frost and somewhere i have never travelled by E.E. Cummings 2, are an interesting exploration of the use of free will and experimental language in contrast to the theme of internal struggle and loss in the precise, exacting prose of James Joyce in his short story Eveline 3, All three works share a fascinating portrait of what it means to feel desire for an imagined fantasy, an envisioned potential outcome and the contemplation of it’s demise. Robert Lee Frost’s The Road Not Taken is a poem about the contemplation of two different possible outcomes of travel down two divergent roads in the woods. When the traveler is first viewing his choices, he notices that the road down the first path is clear to see: “ And be one traveler, long I stood, And looked down one as far as I could, To where it bent in the undergrowth;” The other path, the one our traveler chooses, “Because it was grassy and wanted wear” it turns out may not be as different because “the passing there, Had worn them really about the same”. The contemplation of the two paths, on a literal level, has to do with what the traveler can see and not see on down the road from the vantage point at the beginning of the journey. One path is widely tread and clearly seen. The other one that is unseen, unclear and unknown is the one the traveler chooses. But it is also with this choice that the traveler knows he is ultimately forsaken the other. After all, as he says, “Yet knowing how way leads on to way, I doubted if I should ever come back.” On a metaphorical level the poem is about the internal conflict we all ultimately face when we choose one course in life over another. The poet is telling us about the power of free will, that we no longer live under the age of determinism and pastoral control thus we are free to take our own path in life, which in The Road Not Taken, is the one that others have not. I don’t think that Frost is advocating a specific position in this poem. I just think that he is just showing vs. telling the reader that we exist in a time where we have the power to choose one course in life over another. Thus the lesser traveled path is not always the better path, it is simply the one that is lesser known. The path that has fewer unforeseen consequences at the outset is not greater or lesser, it is simply unknown. I think another misconception that is easy to make about the poem is that the poet is sad or full over regret over the path not taken. “I shall be telling this with a sigh, Somewhere ages and ages hence” refers to the fact that Frost is projecting the outcome into the future. “Telling this with a sigh” I think refers to the acknowledgement of the passing of time and that by the nature of choosing, we do forsake one of our choices. This is not regret, it is rather the simple acknowledgement of the use of free will. After all, in the last stanza “I took the one less traveled by, and that has made all the difference” shows us that there is another option, that in life we do have the power of choice, and in the end, that changes everything. E.E. Cummings was a modern poet who broke with tradition and experimented with the use of the English language in his poetry. He employed the lower case for his name and the letter I, he mixed his verbs and nouns and often used his own spelling and punctuation. His poems, I feel, are rebellious by nature. By breaking with grammatical conventions, Cummings is challenging the reader to enter another world where scientific order and conventional structure have no meaning. His world is one of word play and to enter it, the reader is caught up in the music of the language and the strange visual images that are evoked. The result is that many of his poems seem to flow over you like water and convey a feeling of pure emotional desire and longing or ennui. somewhere i have never travelled by E.E. Cummings is a poem about the longing and desire the poet feels for a woman (I’m imagining that his object of desire is female) who is essentially mysterious and unknowable, someone who the poet is yet to know intimately. The first stanza “somewhere I have never traveled, gladly beyond any experience, your eyes have their silence: in your most frail gesture are things which enclose me, or which I cannot touch because they are too near” is about how we can be physically close to someone we desire, perhaps even on a sexual level as well, and still not know them. The poem is about what it would be like to “travell” into this world of intimacy with this woman and truly know her. So much of the poem is a meditation on the possibility of this encounter and what that would feel like. The lines “your slightest look will easily unclose me though I have closed myself as fingers, you open petal by petal myself as Spring opens” and “or if your wish be to close me, I and my life will shut very beautifully, suddenly” are all about the longing, fear and desire the poet feels for his beloved and what it would feel like to be welcomed or rejected by her. In this way the poem is an anticipatory, allegorical fantasy (comparing himself and his loved one to the opening and closing of flowers, the coming of spring and the rain) about entering the territory of intimacy with another human being. Like Robert Lee Frost in his contemplation of two paths in The Road Not Taken, Cummings is exploring the possibility of what intimacy would feel like to “travell” to an unknown country. He is acknowledging, like Frost does, that there are two different possibilities, two paths that diverge in this world as well. One path takes him into the interior world of his beloved and one keeps him away. Cummings is also showing us that he also has the power of choice because he may be the one who turns away, “though I close myself as fingers”, even though it is clear that he feels his loved one is worth the risk: “(i do not know what it is about you that closes and opens: only something in me understands the voices of your eyes is deeper than all roses)”. The short story Eveline by James Joyce 3 is about a young girl of nineteen, named Eveline, who is in the throes of interior contemplation over whether to leave her childhood home in Ireland to run off and marry Frank, a young sailor who is ready to take her away that night on a big ship, overseas to Buenos Ayres. The story opens with Eveline staring out from behind the curtains of her childhood home “watching the evening invade the avenue.” The story then unfolds with all the personal crispness and sensuous attention to detail that is one of the hallmarks of Joyce’s prose. At this moment in time, Eveline is contemplating the consequences of her momentous decision: “What would they say of her in the Stores when they found out that she had run away with a fellow? Say she was a fool, perhaps; and her place would be filled up by advertisement,,,,She would not cry many tears at leaving the Stores.” 3 Eveline also weighs out the pros and cons of what would be like to leave the familiar comfort of her home and her family. She relives fond memories of playing as a child in the field next to her house with her older brothers and sisters and other childhood friends from the neighborhood. She remembers her father with a few acts of kindness. But as the story unfolds, we come to see that her childhood memories have splintered and broken. Her mother and most beloved brother are dead, the childhood friends have scattered to the wind or died and even the lot has been sold long ago and now has buildings on it. Then she realizes “Everything changes. Now she was going to go away like the others, to leave her home.” The choice of whether to leave or stay is the core dilemma of the story. Eveline looks at the possibility of a new life with her fiancée: “…in her new home, in a distant unknown country, it would not be like that. Then she would be married -- she, Eveline. People would treat her with respect then. She would not be treated as her mother had been.”3 More than anything, she wants to escape the horrible abuse her mother and brothers endured at the hands of her father. Even though she was sparred this as a child, she knows, as the one remaining elder sibling, that the threat of violence living at home with her father is imminent. It is also a hard life, working in the “Stores” all week having to endure the disrespect of her superiors, and then rushing home to shop, cook and clean at the order of her father, looking after the younger children and fearing her father’s wrath. It is clear to the reader that Eveline is given a way out of her childhood misery, the chance at a new life, an escape from oppression to freedom. In this sense, the story is showing the protagonist a clear cut option. Like the two previous poems, The Road Not Taken and somewhere I have never travelled, the character is given a choice. Eveline is at her own divergent road in the woods. But unlike the poet Robert Lee Frost who “took the one less traveled by, And that has made all the difference” Eveline, in the end, frozen by fear, obligation and duty, does not take the only choice out of her situation, and watches as Frank sails away. Eveline is a short piece of prose and feels more like an interior monoluge even though it is written in the third person. We are inside her world with all the smells, sounds and touches of detail that make it come alive. The prose of James Joyce is vivid, exciting and exact. The sentence “All the seas of the world tumbled upon her heart.” is as poetic and beautiful as the poetry of Cummings and Frost. But in the end, it is the heartbreaking choice that Eveline makes (that she likely feels is not a choice at all because she is unable to choose it) that moved me to tears. Eveline is a beautiful work of fiction that poeticly captures a portrait of modern life and loss in 20th century Ireland. The exploration of the various choices available in modern life, the various states of how we come to experience love and loss, and the sensuous play in the delight of language is found in all three works by Frost, Cummings and Joyce. I am personally draw to the poetry of E.E. Cummings and enjoy his exploration of human love and longing. The visual imagery of his work lingers with you and draws you back to it for rereading and further contemplation. James Joyce is equally astounding in his use of language. It is amazing how he can convey so much visual imagery and pull the reader in emotionally with so few words. He is truly a master of the English language. It would be interesting to read one of his longer works of fiction. Although the themes of internal conflict, meditation, and longing are present in The Road Not Taken, somewhere i have never travelled and Eveline, the choices contemplated and made, the exploration of language and visual imagery in the different texts, present three different expressions of possibility, romantic love and freedom. These unique examples of diversity and meditation on a theme are a few of the hallmarks of modern fiction and poetry today. Works Cited 1. Frost, Robert Lee. The Poetry of Robert Frost. New York: Holt Paperbacks, 2nd Revised Edition, 2002. 2. Cummings, E.E. Complete Poems, 1913-1965. New York: Harcourt, Brace, Jovanovich; First Edition. states edition, 1972. 3. Joyce, James. Dubliners. Boston: Signet Classics, 2007. Read More