Classic and Contemporary Poetry: Explained

William Stanley Merwin's poem "Forgotten Streams" is a poignant exploration of the transience of human memory and history against the backdrop of nature's unchanging constancy. The work immediately confronts us with the notion of "unimportant streams," whose names have "fallen into oblivion," invoking an existential query: What makes a stream, or by extension, a life or an event, unimportant? And who makes that determination?

The streams in the poem become a metaphor for the forgotten histories, experiences, and languages that have washed away in the current of time. Merwin mentions specific streams like "Vaurs" and "Divat," as well as "Lherm," implying that what is considered important or memorable is often arbitrary. These names represent lost stories, events, and lives that were once meaningful but have now dissolved into the collective oblivion, simply because they weren't deemed significant enough to be preserved.

Even more poignant is the notion that "we do not speak the same language / from one generation to another." This observation emphasizes the chasm between past and present, parents and children, highlighting the limits of memory and language in transmitting experiences. How much of our history is lost simply because the language we use-literal or metaphorical-changes, and the stories of 'unimportant streams' can't be translated?

Merwin points out that we "can tell little of places where we ourselves have lived / the whole of our lives," signaling the impermanence of personal memory. This raises the question of how we, constantly immersed in our own narratives, struggle to understand even the world immediately around us. If we cannot preserve the texture of our personal lives, "what the sound of voices was or what / a skin felt like or a mouth," how can we hope to hold onto the larger histories, the streams of life and time that flow around us?

The poem's closing lines offer an anecdote that illustrates the point-somewhere, an "unknown mason dug up a sword five hundred years old," now "devoured with rust." What battles did that sword witness? What hands wielded it? What stories could it tell if it could speak? These questions hang in the air, unanswered, as the object itself is disintegrating. "Something keeps going on without looking back," Merwin writes, and it's clear that 'something' is the unstoppable march of time.

This contemplation on forgotten streams, names, and histories culminates in an acknowledgment of the relentless forward motion of existence. The poem functions as a type of historical elegy, mourning not only the loss of names and places but the inability to hold onto the past itself. Yet, despite its lament for lost stories and fading memories, "Forgotten Streams" serves as a reminder that, even without names or recollections, these elements continue to exist and flow in the landscape of oblivion.

In summary, "Forgotten Streams" is a deeply thoughtful work that engages with the complexities of memory, history, and human experience. It presents a sobering but insightful commentary on the fleetingness of existence, urging the reader to consider what is truly 'important' and why. It leaves us to ponder our own roles as both the narrators and the subjects of history's ever-shifting, ever-flowing narrative.

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