Thursday, April 14, 2011

Poem 2: To Be of Use by Marge Piercy



To Be of Use

The people I the best
jump into work head first
without dallying in the shallows
and swim off with sure strokes almost out of sight.
They seem to become natives of that element,
the black sleek heads of seals
bouncing like half-submerged balls.

I love people who harness themselves, an ox to a heavy cart,
who pull like water buffalo, with massive patience,
who strain in the mud and the muck to move things forward,
who do what has to be done, again and again.

I want to be with people who submerge
in the task, who go into the fields to harvest
and work in a row and pass the bags along,
who are not parlor generals and field deserters
but move in a common rhythm
when the food must come in or the fire be put out.

The work of the world is common as mud.
Botched, it smears the hands, crumbles to dust.
But the thing worth doing well done
has a shape that satisfies, clean and evident.
Greek amphoras for wine or oil, 
Hopi vases that held corn, are put in museums
but you know they were made to be used. 
The pitcher cries for water to carry
and a person for work that is real. 
Analysis

       Marge Piercy writes that "the people she loves the best...swim off with sure strokes almost out of sight", meaning that the people that she likes to be around the most are hard working people. They are so consumed with their work that they seem "like half-submerged balls" floating in the sea. This first stanza is interesting because she sets a new type of tone in her writing. It is less depressing and suppressing towards women. I think that at this point in her life when she wrote the poem, she was in college or older because she seems much happier and working with people that are good for her to be around.
       She continues to write that she likes the people who "strain in the mud and the muck to move things forward", which means that she enjoys being around people who work hard in tough times so that they and others can pull through. 
       She likes that these people "move in a constant rhythm". By this, she indicates that she likes consistency and security in her life, which she wasn't given as a child because she wasn't treated right.
       In the next stanza, she alludes to the fact that she wants satisfaction in life, which a 50's woman's lifestyle would not provide for her at all. She is the "pitcher [that] cries for watter to carry" in a world that doesn't want her to.

2 comments: