This week we analyzed some poems written by Joanne Kyger. One poem that struck me most but has not been discussed in class is entitled “Transplant”.
It is a poem about a woman who breaks off with her partner although she still loves him. In the first stanza the speaker provides reasons for her hard though necessary decision. She says that her husband “had […] (her) all mapped out”. In fact, the poem strikes through its geographical images that are linked to the relationship of the former couple.
In the second stanza the speaker mentions how much she misses her husband. Through her language she indicated that she misses him not only psychologically but also sexually: “breathing without your mountains around/ to mirror the white crested peaks of my heartbeat”.
The next stanza is my favourite one since it features through very impressive images. In this stanza she wants to know if it was fate which brought her to her husband. She describes how the Spaniards came to America with “their boot soles were heavy with dirt from the mother country”. I like the ambiguity of this statement. At this point the reader may wonders was she means by this line. By describing them with dirty boot soles she may indicate their dirty intentions which led them entering the “New World”. But, actually, the speaker aims at something else, namely, on seeds that were brought with the dirty boot soles to America. Seeds that only coincidently reached the country. So she wants to emphasize that she may also was brought to where she is now coincidently, because she “arrived here stuck to the bottom of Gods great invisible shoe”-or destiny.
All in all, this poem features through a very figurative geographical language which makes it very unique.
It is a poem about a woman who breaks off with her partner although she still loves him. In the first stanza the speaker provides reasons for her hard though necessary decision. She says that her husband “had […] (her) all mapped out”. In fact, the poem strikes through its geographical images that are linked to the relationship of the former couple.
In the second stanza the speaker mentions how much she misses her husband. Through her language she indicated that she misses him not only psychologically but also sexually: “breathing without your mountains around/ to mirror the white crested peaks of my heartbeat”.
The next stanza is my favourite one since it features through very impressive images. In this stanza she wants to know if it was fate which brought her to her husband. She describes how the Spaniards came to America with “their boot soles were heavy with dirt from the mother country”. I like the ambiguity of this statement. At this point the reader may wonders was she means by this line. By describing them with dirty boot soles she may indicate their dirty intentions which led them entering the “New World”. But, actually, the speaker aims at something else, namely, on seeds that were brought with the dirty boot soles to America. Seeds that only coincidently reached the country. So she wants to emphasize that she may also was brought to where she is now coincidently, because she “arrived here stuck to the bottom of Gods great invisible shoe”-or destiny.
All in all, this poem features through a very figurative geographical language which makes it very unique.
