Lights and Darkness: the Contrast of Life

The Presence against Malthus

Post-modernity has brought many things to the world, that is to say, to the people who live in it. One of these things is the diversity, which, in turn, achieves almost all the sections of the human beings’ life. For instance, we can talk about cultural diversity or simply mention some features related to the social inequalities lived by different races. However, with the aim of discussing the poem To Counter Malthus, written by Margareth Avison, I will focus on what is recognized as economical diversity since it is the most important subject to be considered in order to understand the intertextuality, namely the conflicts of Avison’s and Malthus’ points of view about poverty and population growth.

None us in this so

burdened earth has known

how to live, let alone

who is too many.

The title of the poem [To Counter Malthus] suggests what the following five stanzas will talk about, that is a poetic voice arguing against Malthus’ ideas. To start with, in the first stanza the word burdened and the expression too many lead us to infer that Avison recognizes the weight carried by the people who live on earth and the largeness of people who live in it in an extreme poverty. Conversely, it is interesting to point out that the poet somehow generalizes the suffering since she takes the whole planet as being victim of the contemporary life [full of contradictions and social inequalities]. In other words, according to her, everybody should suffer on account of the ones who have no food and a good life to get pleasure from. Thus, none us is allowed to judge, reject or sweep these people aside because no one is really aware about life or good enough to understand its mysteries.

Presence, each day

afresh, you give a

purifying signal to

sting us alive.

In the second stanza Avison refers to a Presence and then starts to talk to it as if it were possible to reach its existence on earth. This perception becomes probable due to the comma put next to the word Presence, which, by the way, comes out with the first letter capitalized so it seems to be the name of a person. Moreover, after calling this superior being, the poet says that everyday it gives us purifying signal to / sting us alive, that is we are supposed to feel ourselves affected by what the too many live since it is the attitude that we must have in order to be purified in life. The problem is that lots of people regard the suffering beside them but do not look at it with the eyes of compassion.

Vast territories and seashores

still bear these thronging

strangers. May none die

without somebody caring.

In the third stanza the poet mentions the population growth through the words territories, seashores, and bear. She uses these words to explain why Malthus should let alone who is too many and not sweep them aside as if they were animals or simply objects to be thrown away. Her explanation is that the territories are vast, that is to say, the earth is large and for this reason it can still bear the ones called strangers. Furthermore, this is also an important word to be considered in order to understand what the poet means. Why are the too many called strangers? The answer is quite simple: they are not seen as human beings; they belong to the marginalized part of society and as such comprise a group that does not contribute to the Capitalism. In other words, these people do not produce anything for money and consume very little of what is produced in the market. The last two verses of this stanza, however, comes up with the idea that we all should care of these people and not throw them away as it is suggested by Malthus.

To know even one other is

costly. And being known.

Alive, among so many

more now? a concern…

The fourth stanza is formed by four different sentences. According to the first one, knowing the others or even one among the strangers is costly, that is it is difficult and expansive to help them [with food, clothes, and compassion] since it would be necessary to forget ourselves and live one other’s life for this happens. The second sentence, in turn, is a complement of the first one because it reinforces the idea that in order to be known we cannot be poor, namely not to be totally out of the capitalist system. The third sentence is actually a question that also supports the idea expressed by the previous one: it is difficult to be noticed among so many people who live in a critical situation and to whom the attention of the others are never turned; in a few words, these people cannot be thrown at death because they have already died socially. As a consequence, this perception becomes a concern in the last sentence, which, parenthetically, suggests that we all have to be worried of it or at least to think about this concern together with the Presence.

Hunger makes men desperate, threatens

to congeal the quandary. Yet

Presence abides untouched

in the churn of Quantity.

The fifth stanza is the conclusion of Avison’s arguments against Malthus’ theory. Firstly, she uses the word hunger to focus on the consequences of poverty and the ones who always get desperate because of starvation and hence are more likely [or supposed] to be rejected by the social order. Also, it is said that the hunger is what congeals the quandary, that is to say, the dilemma [or the problem] related to population growth. In the last two verses Avison resumes the Presence – the image of God – over the ones who suffer in life. The idea is that this Presence will care of the marginalized and look at/recognize them as human beings, even though it is not touched by the problems in the physical world. Briefly, God abides the Quantity and this is not what will count at the time of revelation; in other words, no one can judge, ignore or expel the poor people from the social life, seeing that they are looked after by a Presence which surrounds and protects everybody who believes in it.

None us in this so

burdened earth has known

how to live, let alone

who is too many.

Presence, each day

afresh, you give a

purifying signal to

sting us alive.

Vast territories and seashores

still bear these thronging

strangers. May none die

without somebody caring.

To know even one other is

costly. And being known.

Alive, among so many

more now? a concern…

Hunger makes men desperate, threatens

to congeal the quandary. Yet

Presence abides untouched

Marco Túlio de Urzêda Freitas

1. Introduction

There are many beautiful and scaring places in the world; everyone is different from each other. Some of them look sadder and lonely, while the others seem to represent the   strongest love and happiness. Thus, what do we have to think about these contradictions? What is it needed to feel inside these magic and antithetic sensations? The answers are quite simple. Firstly, we cannot avoid contradictions in life because they really comprise the existence of every human being; by this means, we must recognize and accept them in our lives. Secondly, in order to feel divergent sensations it is necessary no more than trying to see all the different details of each place, as well as to contemplate every landscape with the eyes of our heart. However, a few people can do it so easily, since it is extremely difficult to turn a physical and geographical place, or even a very short and single moment, into an eternal portrait. I would dare to say that in Literature only a poet and a good reader are capable to do such a thing in a perfect way: the poet with his wise and magic hands, and the reader with his sensible eyes.

This is one of the greatest talents of Archibald Lampman, a Canadian poet who eternalized many landscapes from Canada through his impressionist perception of life.   But, why is he known as an impressionist poet? First of all, so as to understand his lyrical style a bit deeper, it is interesting to point out some characteristics of the Impressionism: emphasis on light in its altering traits, ordinary subject matter, the inclusion of movement as a central element of human experience and sensitivity, etc. Thereby, as a second step toward a successful comprehension of Lampan’s writings, it must be noticed that when we look at an impressionist picture we are invited to reflect on an a simple instant or scenery captured by the painter’s magic sensations. In other words, the Impressionism makes us imagine a whole story behind what the eyes can reach, by the way both in Plastic Arts and Literature. Lampman, for instance, used to write with the eyes of a poet-painter, given that most of his poems, such as Winter Uplands, Temagami, and A Sunset at Les Eboulements, look as if they were photographs in movement, just like the ones which follow:

Berthe Morisot – Mulher de vermelho

Monet – Jeanne Marguerite Lecadre in the Garden

Monet – Tulip Fields With The Rijnsburg Windmill

Van Gogh – Les Alyscamps

2. A Thunderstorm: an example of Sonnet in Iambic Pentameter

Lampan always withdrew an instant of nature and put it into a frame of letters so we feel wondered every time we finally get to the end of his poems. This is the magic of the poetry based on which I aim at discussing the verses of A Thunderstorm.

To start with, it is necessary to say that this poem is a Sonnet, namely a fourteen-line lyric text in predominantly Iambic Pentameter, characterized by a formal rhyme scheme: each verse is comprised by ten poetic syllables and must begin with an unstressed one, as we can see in the scansion below.

In turn, the rhymes of the poem can be scanned as follows:

3. The interpretation

As I said previously, Archibald Lampman is known for his beautiful, lyrical, and impressionist descriptions of nature, that is to say, the photographs of places in movement he makes with letters. Therefore, it is not different in the poem The Thunderstorm, as we can see in the following verses.

A moment the wild swallows like a flight
Of withered gust-caught leaves, serenely high,
Toss in the windrack up the muttering sky.

These three verses seem to describe a moment before the thunderstorm; in other words, it is a description of a scene wherein the leaves are the central element of the “painting”. Consequently, with the purpose of realizing it, we are led to feel some of the five senses, such as vision [the swallows like a flight], and hearing [Toss in the windrack up the muttering sky]. Also, we have to understand the words ‘wild’ and ‘withered’ since they reveal the landscape where ‘gust-caught leaves’, together with the ‘muttering sky’, expect the right moment to fall down. What is more, it is possible to conclude that the sky’s mutter – the “voice” of nature – symbolizes the thunderstorm’s arrival that is a kind of drastic change in the weather.

The leaves hang still. Above the weird twilight,
The hurrying centres of the storm unite
And spreading with huge trunk and rolling fringe,
Each wheeled  upon its own tremendous hinge,
Tower darkening on.

The first sentence of this passage tells us that the thunderstorm has not come yet, which confirm the idea expressed in the previous verses. In addition, the word ‘weird’ plays the part of saying that the ‘twilight’ was both beautiful and unexpected, since the scene with leaves should take place in a different atmosphere. The ‘storm’, in turn, is almost coming and for that reason it unites and spreads some elements of nature, such as the ‘huge trunks’ and the ‘rolling fringe’, in order to show its strength. Conversely, the impressionist movement of this excerpt is shown through the words ‘hurrying’, ‘unite’, ‘spreading’, and ‘rolling’, while the senses we can feel are vision – with the words ‘twilight’ and ‘darkening’ – and touching – with the words ‘unite’ and ‘spreading’. Finally, the last sentence is a part of the whole line. However, I thought it would be interesting to divide it into two different pieces and analyze them separately. In so doing, when the poet says ‘Tower darkening on’ we become aware of the change which will happen soon, that is to say, the painting which will be made with letters.

And now from heaven’s height,
With the long roar of elm-trees swept and swayed,
And pelted waters, on the vanished plain
Plunges the blast.

If we look carefully at the verses above, we will see that now the poet begins to describe the thunderstorm itself. In other words, all the strengths of nature start to be shown and put into a lyrical frame through the poet’s language. At this moment, it is possible to realize a kind of loneliness in the terms ‘vanished plain’, which is something essential to see the landscape as an impressionist and literary painting. With ‘the roar of elm-trees’ and ‘the pelted waters’ we are led to feel the sense of hearing and also recognize it as the first manifestation or sign of the thunderstorm. Therefore, it is from the loneliness, namely the ‘vanished plains’ that the winds, the noise and all the other elements of this natural phenomena start to come. In order to consolidate this picture, the poet creates the verse ‘Plunges the blast’ – part of the last line in focus – as a way of telling us that the probable change of weather has finally got nearer.

Behind the wild white flash
That splits abroad the pealing thunder-crash,
Over bleared fields and gardens disarrayed,
Column on column comes the drenching rain.

These last verses of the poem continue describing the thunderstorm, but now we are led to feel both the senses of vision and hearing at the same time since one complements the other. Firstly, we can see the ‘white flash’ and hear its effects during ‘the pealing thunder-crash’. Secondly, it becomes possible to see the description of the rain itself, namely a ‘drenching’ one, which comes ‘over bleared fields and gardens disarrayed’. In this manner, the words ‘bleared’ and ‘disarrayed’ imply the strength of he thunderstorm, as well as its effects on the landscape in focus and also the kind of ‘fields’ and ‘gardens’ over which it comes. Finally the poet gets to put the place where he is looking at into an eternal lyrical frame; he somehow portraits it so we can observe its inertia and movement at the same time, exactly as it happens with the impressionist paintings.

4. Final Thoughts

As we could see in the poem A Thunderstorm, Archibald Lampman was a man who turned Canadian places into lyrical pictures. With the aim of doing so, he used some elements of the Impressionism to write his poems, such as descriptions of simple images/moments in movement and the presence of some human senses. The sonnet A Thunderstorm, for instance, presents the description of a natural phenomena before and after its arrival so it was possible to realize how the poet observed a place e then described it deeply by making us see, hear, and touch his ‘photographs’. Thereby, it becomes possible to conclude that Lampman was “preparing himself for both thought and dream” and also that he “was not cut out to be a socialist poet; he was a nature poet”.

COMMENTS [...]

COMING SOON

[ T O N I G H T ]

A Thunderstorm

A moment the wild swallows like a flight
Of withered gust-caught leaves, serenely high,
Toss in/ the windrack up the muttering sky.
The leaves hang still. Above the weird twilight,
The hurrying centres of the storm unite
And spreading with huge trunk and rolling fringe,
Each wheeled upon its own tremendous hinge,
Tower darkening on. And now from heaven’s height,
With the long roar of elm-trees swept and swayed,
And pelted waters, on the vanished plain
Plunges the blast. Behind the wild white flash
That splits abroad the pealing thunder-crash,
Over bleared fields and gardens disarrayed,
Column on column comes the drenching rain.

It is very interesting how beautiful a poet can sing upon his own culture and values, even though he seems to feel a kind of missing inside him. For instance, the poem Welsh History, written by R. S. Thomas, starts with the following statement: “We were a people taut for war.” Through this part of the poem it becomes possible to realize that the poetic voice is concentrated on the past in order to make readers go into the history of a people considered old and traditional. However, in the next three verses the poet uses some elements of nature, such as ‘the hills’ and ‘the grass’, to contrast with the idea of ‘war’, which, by the way, is not a kind of war – like we might commonly think – with arms and tanks used as a way of taking many people’s lives out, but a war held ‘mainly’ with hearts and memories acting against the marks left by the past.

“We were a people taut for war; the hills
Were no harder, the thin grass
Clothed them more warmly than the coarse
Shirts our small bones.”

Thereby, the idea of war represents something related to the time, namely the reflex of the past into the present and future, an idea that becomes more pronounced when the poet uses the terms ‘in retreat’ and ‘stranger’ to talk about his people’s history: they represent the feelings of Welsh people in front the new time brought by the outsiders. In order to illustrate this situation, the poetic voice compares his people’s fear and strangeness to some elements of nature – by the way, the same resourse he had already used previously. Moreover, with these words the poet makes us realize that Welsh people really fought against the strangers, but even though they came into their world and stayed there interfering in their lives and cultural habits. Conversely, it is interesting to point out that despite those strangers managed to break into ‘Welsh history’ they were not able to discover all their “secrets”, as we can see in the following passage:

“[...]the stranger
Never found our ultimate stand
In the thick woods, declaiming verse
To the sharp prompting of the harp.”

According to Blanchot (1987), when the poet sees himself on the hands of the endless he tends to move to a place where he is allowed to worship his individual aspects and share them with the others, which means to call the feelings of readers through his own privacy. Thus, it is in the course of his intimate thoughts that the poet in focus metaphorically presents the consequences of the battle wherein his people was forced to take part:

“Our kings died, or they were slain
By the old treachery at the ford
Our bards perished [...]“

After that, the poet literarily transports us to the past in order to make us become aware of its reflex into the present of Welsh people. First of all, it is relevant to mention the terms ‘red past’ and ‘blood’ with the purpose of revealing the reference to the idea of ‘war’, which, as a consequence, remains constant alongside the poem – seeing that Welsh people were and still are fighters who insist in becoming modern without totally forgetting their roots. Secondly, there is a sense of resistance in the words used by the poet since he states that his people was ‘bred on legends’; this collocation seems to put Welsh history as a kind of myth which cannot be touched by the time so it really becomes a legendary folklore to be told from generation to generation all through the eternity. Thereafter, we reach the conclusion that the poet actually intends to show us something that has triggered his apprehensiveness and maybe nervousness about his condition of Welsh man. According to him:

“The great were ashamed of our loose rags
Clinging stubbornly to the proud tree
Of blood and birth, our lean bellies

And mud houses were a proof
Of our ineptitude for life.”

When we read this passage we might ask the following question: Who is the great who were ashamed of the Welsh people’s loose rags and so on? Soon we realize that the English culture, namely the outsiders were the ones who felt like this since they were not used to that quietness which beautifully ornamented the Welsh people’s bucolic life. The ‘loose rags’, in turn, symbolize the insistence of some Welsh people in being remembered for what they represented and lived, and not for what they have become. But, what kind of people have they really become? According to the poet and his references to the past, we are led to infer that Wales’ population is comprised by people whose values were stolen by the outsiders and thus they have converted into a people who somehow tries to avoid the modernity’s arrival. However, it is also clear that the poet himself does not agree with this, especially when he says: ‘[Our] mud houses were a proof / Of our ineptitude for life’. In other words, for him it is not a time for having those houses in mind anymore; it is not a time for contemplating that ‘ineptitude for life’ invaded by strangers. On the contrary, it is the time to stand up for freedom and assume a new way of living. Briefly, the past no longer exists, but the future is something that Welsh people must face, live and accept with the aim of writing new pages of an old history. This perception becomes clearer in the following verses:

“We were a people wasting ourselves
In fruitless battles for our masters,
In lands to which we had no claim,
With men for whom we felt no hatred.
We were a people, and are so yet.”

Käte Hamburger (1975) says that the words uttered by the poetic voice do not sound as something fictional, but, in contrast, as something entirely true. The fact is that in each word – which, by the way, comes up in the form of melody -, as well as in each detail or landscape described we can see the power of the lyrical creativity. Maybe this is what makes us feel both pleasant and astonished with the words of the poet [...] Because we can see what he keeps as a treasure into his greatest desire: being remembered for what he and his people are, and not for what they were. Past belongs to the past and that is it!

As I said before, there is an aspect that goes on throughout the poem: the idea of war in the past and its implication to another battle in the future. Nevertheless, in order to understand it we must comprehend the idea of past and future war. First of all, it is clear that the war which happened in the past of Welsh people was something symbolized by ‘blood’ – so, it is relevant to remember the term ‘red past’. In other words, they could not avoid it and consequently they lost it for the outsiders – a fact that has put them as a people ‘with and without history’, seeing that most of them still insist in denying the present time and recognizing their cultural values only into the eyes of a traditional period. Secondly, in accordance with the idea of a future war, we are led to think about a possibility of change in its course and effects; parenthetically, this is what the poet suggests when he says:

When we have finished quarrelling for crumbs
Under the table, or gnawing the bones
Of a dead culture, we will arise
And greet each other in a new dawn
Armed, but not in the old way.

In my opinion, this is the most important part of the poem – it would certainly be the climax if we were talking about a short story or a novel – because the poet expresses all his feelings with the purpose of confirming what we have already seen/realized previously: the dream of a future different from the past, in which his people would ‘greet each other’ without totally referring to their history; they would be prepared for another/other war/s. The poet himself states that they will be ‘armed’ for battles, ‘but not in the old way’, that is to say, using both the arms and the actions offered by another time comprised by other places, habits, ways of thinking, and, finally, other mysteries to be discovered and exploited by everyone who is inserted in it. In a few words, it is possible to state that this poem, as a whole, is an invitation for Welsh people to go on in their lives assuming their origin but also recognizing the need of change. The central message of R. S. Thomas is: we all must change everything in our lives, even the way we fight and appreciate ourselves’ history. Furthermore, the name ‘history’ refers to a time which was left behind and does not come back. Thereby, what we have to do is to keep the past and question the present in order to build up a new identity and also a new history in the future.

References

BLANCHOT, M. O Espaço Literário. Tradução: Álvaro Cabral. Rio de Janeiro: Rocco, 1987.

HAMBURGGER, K. O gênero lírico. In: _____. A lógica da criação literária. Trad. Margot P. Malnic. São Paulo: Perspectiva, 1975.

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