Notes Toward a Supreme Fiction: It Must Change, V

Notes Toward a Supreme Fiction: It Must Change, V

I was sweetly surprised when I read this canteau. The imagery was so bright and pronounced, yet vague all at the same time. I felt like I understood what Steven's was saying, but by the last line, I found myself second guessing. The colors paint a beautiful Caribbean portrait, but what lies beneath the colors is sending me for a loop. The poem begins with calming blue, then moves into orange, green, turquoise, orange and green, again. These colors are pretty serene, with the exception of orange, that can be taken as vitality and endurance  The poem goes into description about a great banana tree "Which pierces the clouds and bends on half the world." When I first read this line, the tree of life instantly came to mind. The next lines talk about how he (the man of the island) often thinks about where he came from. About how most people see the world as a melon pink (an easy-going, loving color), but how they really should see it is red (a very passionate, intensive color, a color that shouldn't be overlooked). The last lines really got me. "Sighing that he should leave the banjo's twang" has left me utterly confused. I am really trying to think metaphorically, but I can't quite see the connection. This poem jumped right out at me, for what reasons? I do not know.