Classic and Contemporary Poetry: Explained

Adrienne Cecile Rich's "For This" is a poem that delves into the intricacies of connection, language, and ethical responsibility. It explores a symbiotic relationship between the speaker and the addressed, each providing something essential to the other. Yet this relationship is fraught with ethical complexities, as depicted by the imagery of thirst, nourishment, and light.

The poem opens with the speaker acknowledging their dependence on the words of the addressed, comparing their lines to "letters from the dead that stir the nerves." This sets the tone for a dialogue between two entities deeply entangled in each other's lives. The speaker doesn't merely read the lines but "dowses" for them, as if seeking an essential source of sustenance. The notion of "dowsing for a springhead to water my thirst" portrays the lines, and by extension language, as something elemental and life-sustaining.

The imagery of compost and skeletons indicates a recycling of lived experiences, suggesting that the speaker draws upon these as raw material for their own work or existence. They reach out for something vital in the other person's words, a way to "catch the light." This leads to a question: "have I a plea?" The speaker wonders if their dependency on another's words gives them the right to make a request or claim.

The next section shifts into more corporeal imagery, the "ravenous tongue" and "a rift of salt" suggesting both need and satisfaction. The speaker likens their interaction to a transfusion, which underlines the critical aspect of their relationship. The lines "a pack of blood fresh-drawn / hanging darkred from a hook / higher than my heart" poignantly encapsulate the speaker's perception of dependency, revealing both its necessity and its troubling power dynamics.

In the last section of the poem, the imagery of light returns, but now it has become domestic, symbolized by a "pilot light" that "lies low." Language has the power to thaw "the most intractable silence," echoing the ethical duty presented in the final lines. The lighthouse keeper's ethics encapsulate the moral crux of the poem: "you tend for all or none." Light, or knowledge or language, is either available for everyone, or it loses its purpose.

The poem concludes with a warning: one cannot selectively provide this light. There is no middle ground in ethical responsibility: "and still a lighthouse be." You either extend your resources-be it light, language, or love-unconditionally, or you risk invalidating your essential function.

"For This" is a complex discourse on the ethical implications of relationships, especially ones that sustain us. It serves as a meditation on what it means to connect with someone or something deeply, highlighting both the necessity and the perils of such connections. It underscores the ethical responsibility that comes with being a source of light, knowledge, or nourishment for others, asserting that such a role must be exercised with equity and care.

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