Packrat by Naomi Long Madgett

By King Meera -
My trouble is
I always try to save
("save" is usually used in the context of preservation for future use)
everything

old clocks and calendars
("calendars" - serve no purpose except as souvenirs)
expired words buried
in open graves
(like how conversations are recollected and analyzed in the night; gade murde ukhadna)

But hoarded grains of sand
(juxtaposition - hoarding something transient)
keep shifting as rivers
redefine boundaries and seasons
(how memories change with time;
you tweak them and make them more sparkly, more magical or more rotten;
timelines also morph in the land of memories)

Lengths of old string
(string a metaphor for stories, tales woven, the tapestry of life)
rolled into neat balls
neither measure nor bind
(do not serve their original purpose (the object not the metaphor) but only serve as remnants of past times)

nor do shelves laden with rancid sweets preserve
(description of setting - shelves laden with boxes of spoiled sweets from old lovers)
what ants continually nibble away
(shelves cannot protect against the decay of time)

Love should be eaten
while it is ripe
and then the pits discarded
(self-explanatory)
(also #effintruth)

Lord give me at last
one cracked bowl holding
absolutely nothing
(wants to let go and cease to be bound by memories and incompleteness)

Packrat
  1. Bring out the juxtapositions that the poet uses in the poem.
  2. List the images and their effects on the poetic style.
  3. Comment on: "expire" "rancid" "hoarded" "cracked"
  4. What is the philosophy of life that the poet is trying to convey through the poem?
  5. Significance of title
  6. What does the poet mean by "expired words buried in a grave"?

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