Rukeyser, Whitman, and Poetry of Loss

In poetry of loss, there inevitably arises this theme of the unspeakable.  Putting words to tragedy of any scope, and especially tragedy on a mass scale, is a conundrum.... anyone who has grieved or who has comforted the grief-striken knows this, how language fails, how we try anyway.

Where Whitman explores this theme in a more circular, show-not-tell manner, Rukeyser hits us over the head with it in an explicit way.  He implements repetition in these first five stanzas to evoke the "without" to stand for the loss... "What one word must never be said?" leads off the litany, and fittingly so since we are using language here to describe the void.  These are followed by, "What two things shall never be seen?" and then, "What three things can never be done? / Forget.  Keep silent.  Stand alone."  True, and not true.  But maybe that doesn't matter. 

This relationship to aloneness (vs. comradery) is fascinating.  It is just as crucial a topic to Rukeyser as it is to Whitman, but it is approached more ruggedly and with less finesse.  We were asked to consider the relationship between the reader and the poet in this piece, and to me it seems that the use of "you" feels a bit like Rukeyser is yelling at the reader.  It feels heavy-handed as compared to Whitman's finely woven web, and it is the web that catches the flies, yeah?  Can't just whack them on the head to draw them in.

There are similarities, though, in Rukeyser's writing and Whitman's.  Not just thematically but also stylistically-- they both successfully embrace the natural flow of spoken language.