Denise Levertovs Poem the Mutes - Assignment Example

?The Mutes: A Close Reading Denise Levertov’s poem “The Mutes” is a 41-line haunting piece that explores the hidden emotions and longings of men and women as they wander the streets and subways of an unnamed city. Though the poem seems not to follow a specific pattern in regard to how its stanzas are set up, its disjointedness increases the intense feelings of uncertainty and a lack of fulfillment that are present throughout. Levertov addresses two concepts in her intriguing poem, the first being the annoyance that comes to a woman as she is catcalled while a group of men passes her, and the second concept is the disappointment that, to these men, attractive women are nothing more than a work of art to admire but never to love. While Levertov explores these two notions separately, when they are combined the poem reveals both a devastating sadness that the female protagonist feels at being unloved by the strangers that take notice of her, and the inability of the men to put their feelings into coherent words. The opening stanza shows a scene that many people are familiar with, whether they have experienced it firsthand or have witnessed it: an attractive woman being passed on the street by men who jeer, whistle, or make vulgar remarks as the woman retreats. Levertov focuses on the possible meanings of the groans of the men in the second, third, and fourth stanzas, deciding if the moans suggest feelings of lust for the passing woman, or are merely the sounds of men desperate to say something but are unable to find the words. For the first scenario, in which the moans “tell her she is a female and their flesh knows it” (lines 4-5), the woman finds the sounds to be unpleasant, “an ugly enough song, sung by a bird with a slit tongue” (lines 7-8). As men should respect women, these lines show how they could be using their tongues to speak kindly and gently, like a singing bird, but their moans make them sound rude and offensive, and are thus compared to a bird that can no longer sing beautifully. The second scenario brings to light a concept that is seldom considered when a woman is receiving the ill-attention of such men. “Or are they the muffled roaring of deafmutes trapped in a building that is slowly filling with smoke?” (lines 10-12) is a very desperate image, and one can picture men in this situation pounding on walls and doors, silently begging to be freed from their smokey prison. In this context, the groans of the men are out of desperation. They have words that they want to say to this woman - words that may or may not be unpleasant - but they do not have the means to speak them. Just as the deafmutes want to be free from their torment, so do the men who want nothing more than to put words to their groans. The fifth stanza consists of a single line and presents a completely new possibility to the groaning of the men: “Perhaps both” (line 13). Their groans may not, in fact, be unpleasant or intended to be vulgar, but might be their attempts at letting this woman know that they appreciate her beauty. Their desperation might be due to their inability to express how drawn they are by her appearance, that they cannot share with her their feelings. On the other hand, these men could be groaning out of lust, intending very much to be vulgar, and their desperation is due to their inability to not have that woman. She is completely out of their grasp, and their want for her has driven them to animal-like groans. The stanzas that follow focus on the feelings of the woman as she is subjected to the groans of the men, and she attempts to understand the noises for herself. The woman acknowledges that men who groan “look as if groan were all they could do” (line 15), whether they are physically unable to formulate words or simply unwilling. Either way, the woman feels that these type of men can do nothing more than make noises at passing women. Levertov makes it clear that the protagonist of this poem is uncomfortable with the attention of the men, yet the woman, all the same, notes that “in spite of herself, knows it’s a tribute: if she were lacking all grace they’d pass her in silence” (lines 16-19). These men are confirming that the women they pass who they groan at are attractive; ugly women do not receive this kind of attention but are ignored. Though this particular woman may be uneasy by the attention of these men, there is also a gratefulness there that suggests she appreciates their acknowledgement of her beauty. If they did not groan as they passed her, she would most likely assume that she was not physically appealing enough to catch their vulgar attention. Similarly, lines twenty and twenty-one back up this belief that the woman finds the groans of the men to be indications of approval or disapproval: “so it’s not only to say she’s a warm hole.” There is no question that the men most likely have sex on their mind as they pass this woman and groan, but if sex were all they were after, they would groan at every woman that walked passed. It can be concluded from these few lines that the biggest concern of the men is the appearance of the passing women, and that is how they determine at whom they should groan. Again, this prompts the primary woman in the poem to believe that the groaning is a tribute to her beauty, and to little more. After contemplating the focus of the men’s groaning, Levertov, through her protagonist, attempts to decipher the groans. She refers to the sounds as “a word in grief-language . . . language stricken, sickened, cast down in decrepitude” (lines 21-22, 24-25). The groans are a language that lacks words, a single sound that holds many meanings, but the woman is unable to find anything pleasant in them. These lines also show that the language of the groans is an aged one, a language whose meaning has been lost because the groans are used so often. The overuse of the groans have caused them to become twisted or sickened. The groans may have once meant something good, something that would not cause a woman to shy away, but men such as these have altered their meanings. In the lines of the poem up to this point, it seems that the woman cannot decide what to make of the groans. However, stanzas ten, eleven, and twelve show how she has made up her mind, and that the noises from the men are unwanted. “She wants to throw the tribute away, disgusted . . .” (lines 25-27). Regardless of the intentions of the men, the woman is uneasy by the noises that they make. She wants to reject the lustful groans but “can’t, it goes on buzzing in her ear” (lines 27-28). The woman cannot shake the attention she has received, nor can she give up the notion that there may be meanings to the groans that she has yet to fully understand. By being unable to let go of the groans, she continues to contemplate them. The closing lines of the poem reveal just what the woman is contemplating as she thinks on their groans: “ . . . her understanding keeps on translating: ‘life after life after life goes by without poetry, without seemliness, without love’” (lines 36-41). In her eyes, the groans of these men are for many attractive women that they pass, but the groans will always be out of lust, and not out of sentiment or love. The tone and choppy structure of these stanzas reveal distress on the behalf of the woman as she concludes that so many beautiful lives are passing by these men, yet they are being treated as something less than what they deserve. She wants to be acknowledged with poetry, seemliness, and love; without these, the groans of the men, whether out of lust or an inability to form proper words to suggest otherwise, should mean nothing to the women to whom they are directed. It is the woman’s inability to understand the men’s groans that causes her to notice and be saddened by the lack of compassion behind the sounds. Read More