Anne Sexton and Deborah Digges See Things

Cardinal Singing

Song Sparrow Singing

    Humans have been asking forever just what imagination is, what it brings to the table, perhaps compared to the measurements of logic, math, and science. Why must we be bothered with that intuitive, irrational glove box in our Great Jeep of Life, which is our brain—the Jeep with a glove box that spills forgotten items all over the vehicle as we try to move through a day of tasks with as little rejection, defeat, and nightmare as possible.

    But we also know, or sense, the bright side of imagination: it’s not just escape or insanity, but also the tool or vehicle for seeing things anew, for making us think that for the first time we understand something, or at least some important aspect of it.   

 

Cardinal Pretty Sure of Himself

                                                              If we can consider birds things, we’ve just seen how the imagination of Deborah Digges has transformed them. As if finches weren’t already charming enough, she connects them to paradise and Darwin’s sailors. Here again is “Darwin’s Finches” (this time with a single click!):

    http://www.poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/19201

    In a very different vein, here for comparison is Anne Sexton as she transforms the ordinary items in one room of a life. 

The Room of My Life by Anne Sexton : The Poetry Foundation

Yves Tanguy, Shadow Country (D.I.A.)

Is it just me, or is there a comical undertone in Sexton’s exaggerations in the first half or more of the poem? Even when we consider her tragic end, musn’t we hear her winking as well as worrying when she gives us a brother of wood, typewriter keys that are non-stop eyeballs, a Naugahyde dog coffin, a desk that might eat a puppy biscuit? And to me, a rug that’s a conversation of heels and toes feels downright homey. Maybe Sexton has hit on the possibility of Gothic Comedy.

In the end of course, the poem resolves itself on an ominous note. Or is that thunder? And maybe that drama is louder because she’s lulled us—yes, tricked us—with playful, yet not entirely light, stuff leading up to this.
 

Eastern Bluebird

Whatever lightness or darkness one feels in Sexton’s building individual images, surely we can agree that each reveals imagination at work. Whether comic or grave, our perception of typewriter keys and gold rugs and such has been changed forever—and I’d say enlarged. The next time the details of our own rooms turn scary, we can take some comfort in knowing we’re not the only ones living in a state where “nothing is just what it seems to be.” 

By the way, we mustn’t jump to conclusions about the final outcomes for Digges or Sexton. Digges’ finches of love and paradise don’t predict her death any more than Sexton’s humor foresees hers. Instead of focusing on those poets’ darkness, I hope everyone will set out on the next stroll determined to see familiar details in new, surprising ways. If it happens, I’m all ears. If it doesn’t, take another walk. “Fail better.” (Samuel Beckett)

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