A.E. Stallings' "Fishing": Follow Up Discussion

The visitor comments last time were good in ways that invite further discussion, so  I’m posting them today and offering a bit of response. There’s material here for still more talk. And I’ll pretend that’s a reason to offer more photos from Deer Creek State Park.

First, here again is A.E. Stallings’ poem, “Fishing.” Fishing by A.E. Stallings : Poetry Magazine

And for those who'd like more on fish and fishing, here is Elizabeth Bishop’s famous “The Fish,”  which Hannah refers to in her comment.  http://www.poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/22238

 

 

Kelly said...

...thanks for posting the poem. I just read it and enjoyed it. (I liked the "sun ...sweating gold" too, and didn't need those last two lines either.)

I've never been to Deer Creek but have often wondered what it's like. I need to head up there one of these days.

May 13, 2012 11:54 PM

RuneE said...

To me, this poem was "easy":
As a father of three girls and and a boy, I know the situation all too well. :-) Being with your parents doing what you used to love, but now feel that you are growing out of - only you haven't. The relationship and the fun is still there. It's all about the process of growing up and getting independent. You discover that blood is still thicker than water and that you have more in common than the family name. Oh - beautifully written (I'm sure I have lost many of the nice details) with fitting photographs :-)

May 14, 2012 2:23 AM

Jean Spitzer said...

The first photo is my favorite.  As for the poem, I read it before I read your commentary and also felt let down by the last lines.

May 14, 2012 9:31 AM

Groundhog, Woodchuck: What's the Difference?

Hannah Stephenson said...

Interesting...I think the less heavy-handed the end of a poem (especially a rhyming one, especially a sonnet, the better.

Cedar Waxwing

I see what you mean about the ending. I think it hangs on the word "weighing"...

I thought of that Elizabeth Bishop poem, "The Fish," which is not at all my favorite poem of hers (but perhaps one of the most often anthologized). I think there is something to this....that there is a trope of the fishing poem. Maybe?

The poet Marita Dachsel has a strong fish poem ("Fish Stories"). I can't find the full text....just these lines: "The gills were still moving when my father inserted his knife/…when he scooped out the organs he saw the heart still/ pumping. He said nothing…and then/ placed it in my open palm."

May 14, 2012 11:51 AM

Pasadena Adjacent said...

"Life and death weighed in the shining scales,
The invisible line pulled taut that links them both"        

Those two lines in and of them selves have a rather pleasing appeal.Yes, they do seem jagged and contrived placed where they are.

It's always a pleasure to watch you map out a poem into it's rules and regulations via that hard light. I always regret that I wasn't able to grasp (or be exposed) to those kind of concepts when I was young.

May 14, 2012 8:54 PM

altadenahiker said...

Oh, this poem makes me hurt. You are underestimating that last line. It means something other than you think.
 
And I respond:

Kelly, great minds think alike? About Deer Creek—I prefer the hillier locations of Salt Fork and Mohican (and Shawnee, but it’s farther away), but D.C. is brighter, has better rooms, more on-site walking trails and maybe slightly better food. 

Rune, the poem may be easy, but the relationship stuff is all pretty complicated, isn’t it. I find the whole “blood thicker than water” thing a great mystery. Of course, there’s the more cynical version:  “you can’t choose your parents.”  Still a mystery!

Jean, thanks. It’s my favorite too. I can’t help thinking the tree should be at their backs, but there’s something unexpected, pleasantly off about the way they seem to sort of fish into the land.

Hannah, I feel that way about the Bishop. She often makes me work more than I want to—which is probably a good thing. But I also wonder if she’s making me work more than I should need to . . .   The Marita Dachsel lines are powerful!  I do not know her at all.  Finally, I also thought there’d be dozens of poems on fishing, but not really—or maybe I just thought the Stallings poem offered more people more subjects to see, relate to, talk about.

PA and AH, can you say more about that last line or two. I take it that the invisible line is their inextricable relatedness to each other, esp. in the context of life and death, but I think you’re seeing more, or other.

Indigo Bunting--juvenile in awkward, speckled molt??

PA, that mapping doesn’t appeal to everybody, when they are exposed to it in youth. It’s probably like grammar and diagramming sentences—some groove on it, others hate it, and others, like you, didn’t get a fair shot at it.  “Mapping” is the perfect word for it—thanks for that. I also think of puzzles and problem solving in general. And now it occurs to me, maybe even genealogy—how is this related to that in a line of words or beings?  

So many kids think it kills the spirit of a written piece to ask such questions, but I think they can be fascinating. Fortunately, so do some youth.

From there, it’s an easy step to all the adults who assail American education and youth because they've missed some point of grammar—when those on the attack flub one grammatical situation after another, if you just sit back and listen to a few of their sentences. Human nature can be quite the little miracle.