William Stafford: Poems Symbols, Allegory and Motifs

William Stafford: Poems Symbols, Allegory and Motifs

Cold - “Remembering Mountain Men”

Stafford acknowledges, “I put my foot in cold water/and hold it there: early mornings/they had to wade through broken ice/to find the traps in the deep channel/with their hands, drag up the chains and/the drowned beaver.” The Mountain Men had to withstand the inauspicious conditions that the cold water incarnates for them to endure. Stafford places his feet in cold water to get a hint of what the Mountain Men encountered. The coldness of water galvanizes Stafford’s empathy.

Grim glasses - “American Gothic”

Stafford concedes, “If we see better through tiny,/grim glasses, we like to wear/tiny, grim glasses./ The ‘grim glasses’ are emblematic of Americans’ dreadful standpoints. Viewing the world through the inept perspectives occasions Gothic ramifications.

Renaissance - “American Gothic”

Stafford recognizes, “We travel our kind of/Renaissance: barnfuls of hay,/whole voyages of corn, and/a book that flickers its/halo in the parlor.” America’s rebirth is typified by the agrarianism that the corn and hay signify. The book supplements the intellectualism that is dominant in America’s renaissance.

Bi-Focal - “Bi-focal”

Bifocal is a motif for a dual binary. Stafford explicates, “So, the world happens twice—/once what we see it as;/second it legends itself/deep, the way it is.” Based on these lines the two types of world include the superficial and the inner worlds. Accordingly, the world is integrally twofold.

Update this section!

You can help us out by revising, improving and updating this section.

Update this section

After you claim a section you’ll have 24 hours to send in a draft. An editor will review the submission and either publish your submission or provide feedback.