Randall Jarrell's poetry

This week I chose Randall Jarrell to write a few lines about. In his poem entitled “Next Day” he surprisingly uses his technique of speaking on behalf of a woman. When I first read the poem, I was confused by the use of a female voice knowing he was a male poet.
This poem is basically a cry of an old and solitary lady who would like to have company by her, but who has to be alone and suffer from her constant loneliness. It is interesting to take a look at the use of pop culture in this poem: the listing of detergents serves this purpose. If we look at their names: “Cheer”, “Joy”, “All”, we have to notice that they are absolutely the opposites of this old lady’s desperate feelings and life. There is neither cheer, nor joy in her life, and she is not surrounded by all (i.e. a lot of people), she is alone. Then a usual mourning of past comes, she establishes she has changed a lot during the years (but who not?) and now she is troubled by “What I’ve become”—as she says. It is interesting to read the description of her young years, when she was “young and miserable and pretty/And poor”, that time her wishes were simple and humble. She just wanted a husband, a house and children. This list totally fits into the list of expectations towards an average mid-50s woman. She was expected to be a housewife and she even longed for it when she was young (unlike Plath or Adrienne Rich). Then come the desires of an old lady: nowadays she would be happy if she was noticed by the others (e.g. by the grocery boy), but she is not desirable anymore, it is only her dog which gets some attention (she is petted by the boy). She is not young anymore so she will not be noticed. I guess this section would attract Rich’s (or any other woman fighting for women’s right in the 60s or even today): for men women are interesting only if they are beautiful, young and desirable, but if not, no one ever cares for them. They are just subjects of desire, nothing more. As if the fact that the world looks over her (and she does look over them as well) was not enough, she is left alone (if not looked over) by her daughter, her son and her husband. Everyone has many other things to do; they do not have free time to care for her. “I wish for them”-she says, but her cry is not heard by anyone, she is desperately alone. No wonder then that some fanciful young memories come up from “some Gay/Twenties, Nineties, I don’t know…”. Then come some really shocking lines about her present days, she is afraid of her own face and even hates it when she sees it as it is saying to her that she is old. She shares with us her inner feelings about herself and the great dismays of her life. The end is more gloomy and depressive: she is waiting for her death and declares in a really resigned manner that she is not exceptional, and she is just anybody.