Chapter 13 Sound and Sense

I felt the poem "Blackberry Eating" would be an interesting poem to explicate in contrast to the poem on blackberries we wrote an in-class essay on. In Galway Kinnel's poem, "Blackberry Eating" he describes the joys of eating ripe blackberries and connects sounds and meanings throughout the poem.Throughout the poem Galway is able to illustrate the richness of language by comparing it to blackberries. He says the words "strengths" or "squinching" are like blackberries because they have many letters but only one syllable. Just like a blackberry is made up of many little clusters, but only one blackberry. However, the blackberries are tangible while the words are not. Galway is able to describe all the pleasures of eating blackberries, the way in which they fall to his tongue, how they feel in his hands, and how they feel to eat. All of this is a very enjoyable experience that Galway seems to wish he could have with words. However, through sound Galway almost does achieve this tangibility. In the very end of the poem Galway repeats the s sound "squeeze" "splinch" "surge" and so on. These s sounds are very pleasing to the ear and emphasize how pleasing the experience is of eating blackberries. This poem follows the patterns of a sonnet and this further adds to the enjoyment of the poem. At some points, Galway creates lists within a line of the poem. The lists within the lines are kind of like the shape of a blackberry, small clusters that create a blackberry. I believe the comparison between the berries and the "peculiar words" is appropriate. Reading/writing and eating are two things that people tend to do naturally and can miss the enjoyment in. Sometimes we read to pass time or to pass classes, while really we could be missing the true beauty of the language. Similarly, eating we do to stay alive and often miss all the beautiful flavors and colors.