A Postcard From The Volcano
A Postcard From The Volcano [1]
Children picking up our [2] bones
Will never know that these [3]were once
As quick as foxes on the hill;
And that [4]in autumn, when the grapes
Made sharp [5] air sharper by their smell
These [6]had a being, breathing frost [7];
And least will guess that with our bones
We left much more, [8] left what still is
The look of [9] things, left what we felt
At what we saw. [10] The spring clouds blow
Above the shuttered [11] mansion-house [12],
Beyond our gate and the windy sky
Cries out [13] a literate [14] despair. [15]
We knew for long the mansion's look [16]
And what we said of it became
A part of what it is…. [17] Children,
Still weaving budded [18] aureoles [19], [20]
Will speak our speech and never know, [21]
Will say of mansion that it seems
As if he that lived there left behind
A spirit storming [22] in blank [23]walls, [24]
A dirty house in a gutted [25] world,
A tatter [26]of shadows peaked [27] to white,
Smeared [28]with the gold of the opulent [29]sun.
FOOTNOTES
[1] It contains double meanings under the surface meaning: the postcard has been
sent from the region in which a volcano exists, or the postcard is the picture of
the volcano.
There are double layers under the surface of this poem. The first one of which
refers to the volcano as the background of the house, and the other one refers to
the whole setting as the postcard.
[2] The narrators are the dead.
[3] Referring to the bones.
[4] This 'that' is another noun clause which refers to the first stanza, meaning the
children picking up our bones will never know that….So the subject of these two
stanzas is 'children'.
[6] Referring to 'the bones'.
[7] Meaning freezing temperature. 'Breathing frost' means it was cold.
[8] It is not only the bones which are left but more than that.
[10] It is not only the bones. We see them, and we feel them as they were.
[11] Covered in order to protect.
[13] Shout loudly because of fear, shock, or pain.
[14] This word refers to the knowledge of the sky of what happens and the
ignorance of the children.
[15] The clouds are moving and the wind blows.
[16] We knew for a long time by the mansion's look.
[17] And what we said of its look becomes a part of it.
[18] Resembling unopened flower.
[19] Halo. This word depicts the innocence of the children.
[20]The children weave that in order to remember the dead.
[21] The next generation has the picture of us with the utterance.
[24] Children will talk about the house in a way that the person who lived there
left a spirit in the broken walls of the house.
[26] A ruined or damaged state.
[28] Spread over. It has the negative connotation.
ANALYSIS
'A postcard from the volcano' is framed with the incorporation of double sides. The main one is the 'children' and the 'bodies' whose relation makes the whole structure of the poem. The mansion added in the middle of the poem is the core which tries to relate these two sides, and indeed it relates them successfully, but ultimately all those related pieces broken to make that double sides not only on the children and bodies but the whole things that are mentioned in the poem. At last double postcards are made. The first one of which is the talking of the bodies about themselves to the children and the other one is the children who entered the bodies' world. Stevens does not take any sides since he only depicts them for the readers to make them decide which one they want to choose.The children and the bodies, the core sides of the poem, are mentioned side by side in the first stanza since they are physically related, 'children picking up our bones', but the positive designation of the bodies as 'foxes' contrasts with the negative description of the children as ignorant people, 'will never know'. In the second stanza the bodies, which contains the whole stanza, are still in relation with the children since the 'that' in the first line depicts. This is the other that clause that is related to the previous stanza. So children picking up our bones will never know that we both were as quick as foxes and had being in autumn.
Therefore, children, which had a relation with the bodies, mentioned not directly but with the use of that. In this way, the poet signifies the significant of the bodies in this stanza. The poet multiplies this significance by referring to the bodies as the people who had beings. Children are mentioned by the same technique but not the same word in the third stanza. The poet uses 'will' to depict the children indirectly. 'Will' relates the pervious stanza to the following one simultaneously.
The bodies are emphasized more. Since the poet does not want to reiterate all those techniques he used in the previous stanzas he employs another technique, which is the unfinished sentence in the last line of the stanza. So the stanza is unfinished to depict double use, in my idea. The first one is making a relationship between the previous stanza and the following one, and the second one is depicting the broken sentences step by step to reach the last stanza. It is not the children who are referred indirectly in the fourth stanza but the bodies. There is not even an indication that the children existed. For the first time in the poem nature and mansion house are brought to the game the poet played with the children and the bodies. The depiction of the nature not only makes the picture of the mansion more mysterious but contrasts with the picture of the children fully in the next stanza since the children were ignorant people who, optimistically, can only guess, but the nature, or the sky in order to be more specific, is literate. The role of mansion is significant in the fifth stanza since it gets the being, ‘mansion's look’. The relation of the mansion with the bodies is what we, as the readers, must bear in mind since it is as if it takes the bodies in itself. Therefore, the relation of the children and the bodies, which was so strong at the beginning of the poem, is cracked stanza by stanza, which means the children are forgotten step by step, the bodies becomes more significant, and the mansion takes the place of the bodies in significance.
It is as if we have a new postcard in the sixth stanza since the children which were fallen through the cracks are repeated once more but now in a new way. The children are weaving the 'budded aureoles', which shows their desire to be in relation with the bodies since 'still' suggests, which refers to the continuity of this situation, which existed before, up to this time. The children still weave the aureoles to remember the dead. They now have the ability to speak their speech.
The bodies are mentioned indirectly by 'will' and 'our', and the mansion is referred by 'it'. If the stanzas are related to each other by the uncompleted sentences, and indeed uncompleted stanzas, up to this part, the sixth stanza is related to the next one by the comma. The technique of the seventh stanza is the repetition of the technique of the second stanza. In the second stanza it is ‘that’ that relates the first stanza to the next one, but here it is 'will' which relates the two stanzas. Children both speak the bodies' language and talk about the mansion.
Here, it is as if that the children become knowledgeable since they enter the mansion like the dead, who entered before, and talk about the mansion and a spirit. The children now talk their language and have a picture of the bodies, but this picture is the picture of a spirit which is storming in the broken walls of the mansion. This negative picture of the mansion is emphasized in the last stanza, which is related to the previous stanza by the comma but now without any word that can relate them together since the poet, who cracks the sentence formation by leaving them incomplete before, now breaks the structure of the sentence completely since the readers become confused when they reach 'smeared'. The mansion house, which once had a being, becomes a dirty house, nature, which was literate before, is a gutted world now, and the bodies with the children, who were in the mansion in the previous stanza, are unified and become shadows that are in a ruined state. The poet collapses every idea that he had from the beginning obviously. But what makes this poem complex is the 'opulent sun' which is a twinkle which shines the collapsed construction. In this way, the poet goes into the double sides at the end, which are the negative side which is pictured step by step, even in the structure of the sentences, and the positive side which is giving the bodies and the mansion beings and the depiction of the sun.
The third postcard can be added to the two mentioned postcards since it is as if the poet now speaks with the readers in the last stanza, and makes the whole poem as a postcard. The poet talks with the readers about the double sides clearly. Now it is as if our duty, as the readers, to get the positive view as the main view in the poem or the negative view as the central one.
Maryam Javaherinia