This is t
he fourth poem I’ve read from Cummings, and I have yet to make much progress in understanding them. The structure of this poem however looked a lot more manageable than any of the others; three simple stanzas. With Cummings, however, there is never a “simple” anything, no matter the structure. Fortunately, this poem has real words, never mind the meaning, the words are at least understandable, contrary to some of the other Cummings poems. The confusion immediately begins with the title, [what if a much of a which of a wind].
A strategy I often find myself using in heavy stanza poems is to isolate them. Specifically, if they start with something similar. This poem had each stanza start with a “what if,” so each stanza could be a new thought.
The first stanza kept bringing in an idea of wind, and maybe the ruins that come with (“bloodies with dizzying leaves the sun” “yanks immortal stars awry”), prompting me to think about the potential negatives that come with wind. The use of metaphors with the sun and immortal stars speaks to the intensity of the wind, so I then thought maybe it was a tornado. My hunches were just that, I had no confirmation of any of my thoughts. Fortunately, as I kept reading, I could come to a strong conclusion on the first stanza, and maybe the poem overall. The line, “the single secret will still be man” made me think of the single cause being man, or mankind. That was an easy answer, the main fault of mankind, is the destruction of our planet. With this in mind, I reread the first stanza. Despite some confusion on word choice and placement, I gathered a general point of the consequences of the destruction of our planet. I then carried this thought to the next stanza.
The second stanza brings up wind on the first line but immediately divulges into sleet and snow. Disasters with snow and sleet; blizzards. This entire thought process started on a tangent, and I was too far gone to start another one. The idea of blizzards or snow storms kept me fairly confident, and so I continued. “strangles valleys by ropes of thing and stifles forests in white ago,” surely that is snow I thought. On the next line, I noticed a pattern. “Blow king to beggar and queen to seem” in the first stanza, and “Blow hope to terror;blow seeing to blind.” I identified the pattern, but I have no idea what it means. Hope to terror, seeing to blind, showing the complete opposites. The “blow” seems out of place, but then again, it’s a Cummings poem. Without the “blow,” each of the sentences shows a positive to its complete negative, suggesting the dire change/destruction to the planet. The last line of the stanza however created some confusion. “It’s they shall cry hello to the spring.” Does it suggest that the spring will come sooner than we would expect, or that it would cease to exist, or something else?
The third stanza begins with “what if a dawn of a doom of a dream,” suggesting an end of the world moment. “Bites this universe in two” symbolizes something of great intensity and power. I thought of possible things that could bite this universe in two. An earthquake (another natural disaster), didn’t necessarily align completely with the idea. A BOMB! A manmade creation that rips the world in two, sounded about right.
The last line solidified my tangents. “the most who die,the more we live.” This was fortunately an immediate giveaway. From the poem, people equals destruction, and the less destruction the better.
On my first read, I avoided the parenthesis, much like how we did in class one day. Finally, I read the poem again. This time, I looked at the parenthesis, and like any Cummings poem I’ve read, the parenthesis is a simple expansion of thought, not needed, but helps divulge deeper into the topic.
Overall, Cummings wrote this poem with a vision. From my perspective and juvenile knowledge of analysis with poems, I thought of the poem coming with a strong attitude against human behavior. It goes on to talk about the pure destruction that comes out of humans’ time in the world, and that the less in number we are the better the world would be. The confusing words and their placements speak to the depth and meaning of Cummings and an author, but also his work and the meaning behind it.