Hear poetry professor Stephen Cavitt read “Waking Up in America” and discuss writing inevitable endings.
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Read the transcript below.
Intro
Welcome to the Poetry Professor Podcast with Stephen Cavitt, where every week I read you an original poem, and then we talk about its key technique.
In today’s episode, you’ll hear “Waking Up in America” from my book Noctis Terrores, and then we’ll talk about writing inevitable endings. Here’s…
Waking Up in America
James Robb Colorado River State Park
Fruita, Colorado
The moon is a pale owl arcing west.
The stars have slipped back behind the blue.
Impossible to imagine they’re still out there
in all that oh god don’t think about it black.
Anyway, the birds are fine with it.
They’ve been calling since dawn,
bending the tips of the cattails,
fat feathered berries among the junipers.
Slow bees buzz by the tent, or if you’re sleeping out
with a ground pad and a sack of clothes for a pillow,
a few ants have probably found the valleys of your toes.
You’re too old to believe the morning’s promises,
but your heart perches on the tip of your ribcage
and warbles. Listen, I don’t make the rules.
I don’t know why it’s only good to be alive outside,
but here you are, waking up in America.
Everything is possible, and most of it good.
Your hound rolls to one hip, stands stiff-legged,
lowers his shoulders in a stretch.
His tail begins to wag.
Discussion
You want the ending of a poem to feel inevitable, like we’ve been building toward it all along. If you’ve ever been to a yoga class or meditation and the leader rang a bell at the end, that’s what we want: one clear note that rings out and keeps ringing as you leave the poem.
So first, let’s talk about a couple things we don’t want to do, and then we’ll talk about success strategies. First, don’t end the poem on the same line that you used for the title.
You want the ending to have a lot of impact, and you also want the title to have a lot of impact. So if you give away that surprise by putting it in the title, then that ending is going to lose some of its punch.
Second, we don’t want to end with an academic style conclusion, or an essay conclusion. Here in this poem, that would look something like, “In conclusion, it’s going to be a good day.” Or, “I should be as happy as my dog is to wake up. It’s the little things that matter.” I don’t want to tell my reader what to think. Instead, I want to put my reader into a moment and let those insights arise naturally.
So here are three ways we can try to create the inevitable ending.
Number one: end with action. That’s what I’m doing in this poem. There’s a little bit of statement about waking up outside: “Listen, I don’t make the rules. I don’t know why it’s only good to be alive outside. But here you are, waking up in America. Everything is possible, and most of it good.”
And then we finish with action: “Your hound rolls to one hip, stands stiff legged, lowers his shoulders in a stretch. His tail begins to wag.” So this is the counterpoint to that frequent advice of beginning in medias res. You want to end while the poem is still happening. You pick the fruit while it’s ripe. And so the characters or the scene are still going on beyond the end of the poem.
Strategy two: end with imagery. And really, you could call the ending of this poem imagery as well. I’m calling it action because the dog is doing something, right? There are verbs happening.
But it’s also a sensory image. Here, for a strict imagery ending, I could end with sunlight on the willow leaves, or the Colorado River flowing by, or something else landscapy, and that would be pure image. It’s got to be something deliberately chosen, and the emotional tone has to match the emotional tone of the poem.
Three: you could end on a statement. The best example of that so far, if you’ve been listening to the earlier episodes, is the last sentence of going alone from Episode Three, and that one goes the “hound leans over the gunnels and watches the ripples that will become the southern border of the United States of America. For him, this river is the only country there is.”
And we don’t want it to be a preachy statement. So in that example, the speaker doesn’t say, “Oh, I should be more content like my dog.” Or, “if I only focused on the river instead of those women I met at the hot springs, man, I wouldn’t be so lonely.” The camera stays tight on the dog, right? It stays in the moment instead of telling the reader the moral of the story. But it is a statement, right? “For him, this river is the only country there is.”
All three of these approaches, ending with action, ending with imagery, and ending on a statement, they all keep the poem alive, so the reader does the final processing, that final 2 plus 2 equals 4, instead of you handing it to them. Poetry is slow food, not fast food.
Let’s hear “Waking Up in America” one more time, and notice how it builds toward what I hope is an inevitable ending, in medias rez.
Here’s “Waking Up in America” from James Robb Colorado River State Park in Fruita, Colorado.
Waking Up in America
The moon is a pale owl arcing west.
The stars have slipped back behind the blue.
Impossible to imagine they’re still out there
in all that oh god don’t think about it black.
Anyway, the birds are fine with it.
They’ve been calling since dawn,
bending the tips of the cattails,
fat feathered berries among the junipers.
Slow bees buzz by the tent, or if you’re sleeping out
with a ground pad and a sack of clothes for a pillow,
a few ants have probably found the valleys of your toes.
You’re too old to believe the morning’s promises,
but your heart perches on the tip of your ribcage
and warbles. Listen, I don’t make the rules.
I don’t know why it’s only good to be alive outside,
but here you are, waking up in America.
Everything is possible, and most of it good.
Your hound rolls to one hip, stands stiff-legged,
lowers his shoulders in a stretch.
His tail begins to wag.
Prompt
If you’re writing along with me, write a poem with an inevitable ending. Try one of those three strategies: end with action, like I did here. End with imagery. Or end with a statement that’s not too preachy or too much like an academic essay conclusion.
Closing
Today you heard “Waking Up in America” from my book Noctis Terrores, and you got to meet my late dog, Riley. The book’s available on Kindle Unlimited and in print at major booksellers, and the link’s in the episode description. I’d love it if you picked up a copy.
I’ll see you next week.