“The Wake”
“The Wake” is eclipsed by desolation that cannot be blocked: “ Your absence distributed itself/ like an invitation/ Friends and relatives/kept coming, trying/ to fill up the house/ But the rooms still gaped-” The imagery of the wake exposes dismal void that cannot be exterminated by the associates and family members. The vacuum is somatic and imperceptible: “When I sat down in your armchair/your warm breath fell/ over my shoulder/ When I climbed to bed I walked through your blind departure.” The speaker is flabbergasted by the concavity that is omnipresent in the house. Death galvanizes lonesomeness in the survivors for each item that is recognized, such as the armchair, retells the survivors about the deceased.
“From the Sidelines”
“From the Sidelines” is a critique of masculinity: “It seems I have always sat here watching men like you — /who turn heads, whose gaze is always either a kiss/or a slap or the whiplash of pure disregard.” Rita Dove’s annotations conjecture that the ramifications of masculinity can be projected. The gaze embodies the males’ broad-spectrum outlook which stimuluses the way they regard females. The last line, “How she tells herself to move on; blinks until she can”, proves that the masculine inclinations shape the females’ encounters specifically with the males.
