Vivid Imagery

The selection “The Fish” by Marianne Moore caught my attention for its heavy use of visual imagery. I had to read it more than once. The word choices in this poem are so precise and specific that with each read word, a new or more detailed image shows. Overall, the poem presents a fluid and violent picture.

Words like “injured,” “abuse,” “ac-cident,” “burns,” and “hatchet strokes” really turned the sea from a usually picturesque image to that of a destroyer and murderer. Maybe it’s because my roommate has been watching the TV series Dexter this week(it’s about a serial killer) that I’m relating this to violence, but really, how many people, when you mention the sea or the ocean, think about its brutality?

As Dan wrote, Modernism is uncommon thought toward very common subjects. Moore uses this strategy throughout the poem. My favorite example is the line that describes the shafts of sun as being “split like spun glass.”

The ending of the poem gave me a sense of the time period: the acceptance that there will always be destruction in life, and that though it is not happy, it is a fact that we all have to deal with.