The Thing Is Essay Questions

How does the form of "The Thing Is" interact with its content? How does this relate to Bass's body of work as a whole?

"The Thing Is" is a sixteen-line, single-stanza poem written in free verse. Rather than use a regular meter, Bass employs repetition in order to create rhythm in this poem. For example, the first line repeats the phrase "to love" in quick succession. Bass commonly uses free verse in her work, but she uses other methods such as repetition and alliteration in order to create rhythm.

"The Thing Is" demonstrates the way that the speakers in Bass's poems often have an open and accessible voice. The phrase "the thing is" is used in common speech to introduce an argument or point of view, and the use of the phrase as the poem's title gives the poem a conversational quality. Even when discussing something difficult such as grief and despair, Bass's poems have a conversational and often optimistic tone.

The first line of "The Thing is" instructs readers to love life, but the lines that follow outline a scenario in which a person wonders how their body can withstand the weight of grief. This means that the volta of the poem occurs in the lines, "Then you hold life like a face / between your palms" because it is here that the poem shifts its focus. The concept of loving life was already introduced, but choosing to love life even while experiencing heavy grief is the fully developed thesis of this poem. Bass often introduces an idea in her poems and then develops it further in order to arrive at a surprising conclusion after the volta. The poet has stated in interviews that surprise and transformation are important to the way she approaches her craft.

What images does Bass develop in this poem?

Stress, loss, and grief are evoked through imagery in the poem "The Thing Is." Bass describes extremely stressful times in life through the lines "everything you’ve held dear / crumbles like burnt paper in your hands." The use of the second person actively engages the reader's imagination, and the image of holding ashes is striking. Later in the poem, grief is characterized as a tropical heat that makes the air water-like and difficult to breathe. This helps portray grief as a heavy experience, and this heaviness is then developed into the image of grief as excess body weight: "an obesity of grief." The last important image in the poem is of life's (personified) face. Life has "a plain face," with "no charming smile" or "violet eyes." Here, the image is less specific because Bass describes life's face by stating what it is not.

Why might it be important that life has a "plain face"?

As previously stated, Bass describes life's (personified) face by stating what it is not. The word "plain" is already unspecific, and characterizing life's face as having "no charming smile" or "violet eyes" serves to confuse the reader's imagination. After reading these descriptions, a person might think of someone with a charming smile and perhaps picture violet eyes, but the word "no" works to immediately banish these images from the mind of the reader. This was all done purposely on Bass's part, perhaps because life itself is so vast and complicated that it cannot be reduced to one simple image. But the word "plain" suggests that one mustn't love life only during extraordinary and beautiful times. Rather, the speaker argues that one must choose to love life even while experiencing the heavy weight of grief.