10/03/2010
Heavy weight of freight car trains presses down like
Winter winds, like woolen blankets, like damp foreheads,
Akin to your late-night words.
Sometimes I think I hear you on the muffled line,
Strangling your words—oppressing love, hate
But then I realize that you’re right in front of me.
Shadows never really go away.
They creep around surfaces. Fluid and agile, they slip through cracks
They slip through time, space.
They risk detection.
I tell you every day you’re disappearing.
Your shadow sticks. No need to sew it back on.
You wish it wasn’t so dark, messy.
You wish it didn’t make you so fragile.
Your other half, your coup de grâce.
When life fades, you merge.
You were always your darker twin.
I received an e-mail this morning regarding this poem, and I thought I would share my analysis of the writing with anyone interested. Here is the e-mail:
ReplyDeleteI was researching for a dance idea based around shadows and I came across your poem. I really enjoyed your poem and would be really grateful if you could explain it to me, as we are all in different minds about the meaning.
-Tanya
Hi Tanya,
Thanks for the message! It's cool to know people can stumble across my poetry. As in all poetry, the reader can interpret his/her own meaning.
For me, the first stanza is a realization by the speaker that she is "doubled." Her shadow represents the darker side of herself from which she cannot escape. She will always be attached to her shadow and, therefore, will never be able to escape the "Heavy weight of freight car trains press[ing] down like /
Winter winds, like woolen blankets, like damp foreheads," because she realizes that her shadow is representative of her own darkness from within.
When I was writing the second stanza, I imagined the speaker looking in a mirror and declaring to herself "I tell you every day you’re disappearing.
Your shadow sticks. No need to sew it back on.
You wish it wasn’t so dark, messy.
You wish it didn’t make you so fragile." The speaker realizes that although her shadow is part of her "darker" self, her identity depends on this part of herself. Without her shadow, she is not whole. The last line "You were always your darker twin" is the speaker's coming to understand that the darkness she has been trying to escape or understand is her "true" self. Who she sees in the mirror is simply her social representation of herself to others. She now understands the essence of her true self, and she and her "shadow" can begin to merge into one personality. She is no longer "doubled" or "shadowed" by the dark side of herself.
Hope this helps!
-Katie