"Earthly Anectedoct" has thrown me for a loop. The first time I sat down with this poem, I was tempted to throw my "Bible" through the wall, but decided to keep my composure, due to ethics and what is known as common courtesy. So, I ventured, through this poem, red in the face and reluctant. After what felt like hours of attempting to make sense of the poem, I finally left, defeated and jittery from all the coffee, prepared to take another look in the morning with fresh eyes. The next day, I reopened this poem and took a deep breath, only to exhale one big "WTF"... But didn't feel that I was too far in left field, as this is the usual interpretation of most poetry, and especially, Wallace Steven's poetry. It wasn't until class the next day when James the Rat insinuated that Steven's poem was chalked full of metaphors and the like. And then, like a very florescent, and honestly, quite irritating little light of mine had miraculously shone in the metaphorical darkness of my literal mind, (and I was about to let it shine) I discovered that I needed to start reading between and inside the lines; I was about to embark on the path of poetic discovery. The literal was to be left outside of class from now on.
As the frustration lingers on, I have decided not to think too hard, and go with how it feels. My favorite aspect of art is how open it is to interpretation. The artist passes his masterpiece along, allowing the recipient to discover their own story within it; millions of stories can come from one work of art. With that approach, I am going to attack Stevens' poetry.
In this poem, I the most pronounced symbolism I see is the conflict of life and death: the buck contributing as life, and the firecat "bristling" as death. With life's constant aversion to death, death never stops to rest until it has achieved what it came for: "Later, the firecat closed his bright eyes/And slept". And that was my epic mind blowing interpretation of the poem.
I thought I was on the right track and then I read: "Stevens himself wrote, 'There is no symbolism in "'"Earthly Anectedot"'" ". *
*thiqaruni.org/arab/426/(6).doc
I had the same frustrations with this poem. I felt completely overwhelmed while reading. One thing that has really helped me with all the Stevens poems is to do what Sexson said and think of it as music rather than a poem. I've gained such a better understanding of Stevens by forgetting the content and focusing on how the words make me feel and what images it brings to my mind.
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