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Jack Park

Mr. Damaso

Honors English II, Period 3

6 May 2012

Accepting the Flaws

You have to accept whatever comes and the only important thing is

that you meet it with courage and with the best that you have to

give.

—Eleanor Roosevelt

On January 20, 2009, Barack Obama was sworn in as the first president of the United

States. After centuries of racial prejudice and hatred, Barack Obama, among other figures like

Marin Luther King Jr. and Rosa Parks, stands as a symbol of the progress that the United States

has made in accepting people of varied races. But without racism and segregation, the

courageous acts that these, and a great many other people, have made could never exist. People

fight and struggle with this concept of accepting both the fault and the beauty in life. This search

for closure permeates all levels of our society. In art, Michael Jackson in his song Man in the

Mirror, decides that one must accept their flaws by looking “in the mirror” and act to make a

positive change. Similarly, the concept of Realism in the visual arts finds the beauty and grace in

depicting the world for what it is, with all of its imperfection and asymmetry. However, this idea

is not confined to only the visual or musical arts. It also extends into the vast field of the literary

arts.

One group of literary artists in particular, poets, seek to find a solution to how one should

accept life. While several poets scratch the surface of this question, Linda Pastan cuts through

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the outer membrane of simple platitudes to find a deeper meaning through her poetry. Linda

Pastan is an American poet who is famous for her extensive use of symbolism. Born in 1932, she

currently lives in Potomac, Maryland. She has often been considered for the national poet

laureate of America, and has served as the poet laureate of Maryland. Her poems are often

referred to as both deep and meaningful through her extensive use of imagery. While Linda

Pastan has written many wonderful poems, her poems “Grudnow”, “I am Learning to Abandon

the World”, and “To a Daughter Leaving Home” most directly seek the answer to the meaning of

life. These three poems share a theme of accepting both the good and the bad or imperfect in life.

While one is tempted to dive directly into the deep imagery and precise diction of Linda

Pastan’s poems, it is equally important to observe the author herself. She was born in New York

City in the year of 1932, and she still lives to this day (Linda Pastan). Mrs. Pastan graduated

from Radcliffe College in Cambridge, Massachusetts with a B.A. degree. She graduated from

Simmons College in Boston with an M.L.S. degree. Finally, she graduated from Brandeis

University in Waltham, Massachusetts with a M.A degree (Linda Pastan). Linda Pastan married

Ira Pastan and become a housewife which made her very unhappy (Linda Pastan). Her husband,

noticing her unhappiness, encouraged her to return to poetry. This unhappiness shaped some of

Linda Pastan’s poetry (Linda Pastan).

Linda Pastan’s struggles within her life mirror her interesting and unique style.

Considered a master of imagery, Mrs. Pastan ignores the traditions of both meter and rhythm.

This leads her to write almost entirely in free verse, a form that is not confined by meter, rhythm,

rhyme scheme, or any other constraints, save for the ones the poet chooses for him or herself. In

order to compensate for her seeming lack of order, Pastan makes use of very specific diction,

pursuing her subject with a needle-thin precision (Franklin). She uses imagery to examine the

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difficult themes of morality, love, the inevitability of death, and the meaning of life. One of the

greatest influences to Pastan’s poetry was the interruption of her literary career when she

assumed the role of housewife (Franklin). Pastan defends her lifestyle as a housewife, saying that

a housewife experiences both great joy and great sacrifice. The historical era and events that

raged about Linda Pastan’s head as she wrote also played a large influence on her poetry.

Linda Pastan lived through multiple periods of great turmoil as well as growth. She was

born in the early 20th century, just before the rise of industrialism and the dawn of globalization.

She also lived through WWII and saw the rise of domesticity. Clearly one of the most prominent

of the events she witnessed was World War II. Linda Pastan is Jewish and the anti-Semitic Nazi

movement had a large impact on her poetry. During the Nazi regime, the German people wanted

legal discrimination and action taken against the Jewish people (Hartman). Rather than shying

away, Linda Pastan accepts the terrible atrocities of the Nazi regime and courageously expresses

the fear it caused in her poetry. Not many poets, or people for that matter, are comfortable

expressing their fears for the world to see. Another important historical event that added context

to her poetry was the decline of the classic humanitarian education. People had lost sight of the

value of humanities and the arts. They did not realize that true humanities promote many positive

values, including integrity and honesty. They help us to become less and less like animals, and

more civilized (Hintz). Pastan realized the need for the humanities to re-inspire people and is one

of the reasons that her poems are so meaningful.

While Linda Pastan’s body of work expresses themes of morality, love, the inevitability

of death, and the meaning of life, the poems “Grudnow”, “I am Learning to Abandon the

World”, and “To a Daughter Leaving Home” specifically deal with accepting the beauty in the

flawed nature of life. These poems express an acceptance of hardship, of loss, and of change.

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Speaking generally, critics say that the poem “Grudnow” is about a grandfather and his

description of his hometown, Grudnow, before immigrating, and a view of Grudnow, through the

eyes of his granddaughter as well as her idea of what life in Grudnow would be like for her

(Constantakis 72). Likewise, the poem, “I am Learning to Abandon the World” is about the slow

and inevitable approach of death, and accepting this fact. (Overview). Finally, the poem “To a

Child Leaving Home” is about a child’s future adulthood and her departure from the mother’s

life (Greenbaum). These are scholars and critics didn’t seem to exhibit any sort of ulterior

motives or bias beyond personal preference. Rather, they sought to critically analyze and review

her poetry and create accurate and reliable articles to be used in research.

While the general ideas within the poems are great, the deeper ideas unearthed by

analysis are even better. For example, Linda Pastan’s poem "Grudnow", is about accepting the

hardships of life while also cherishing the joy in it. Constantakis believes the poem is about how

acknowledging both the painful and the pleasant moments of the past are equally important to

remembering it (Constantakis 76). The critic goes on to observe that one cannot truly recall a

memory without accepting all facets of it. If one only chooses to remember the good times and

ignore the hardships, then one warps and twists the past, making it less than it was before.

Therefore, one must accept the entirety of their past, both the ease and the struggles, in order to

respect its memory and pay it homage. In the text itself, the speaker recalls her grandfather

saying “He left… because there was nothing there” (Appendix A Lines 8-9). This excerpt from

the poem expresses the hardship of Grudnow, prompting her grandfather to leave and immigrate

to America. However, it is important to note that he still recalls the hardships endured there.

Later, the poem depicts the people as “standing/ against a landscape emptied/ of crops and trees,

scraped raw/ by winter” (Appendix A Lines 12-15). This also expresses the hardships in

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Grudnow. It emphasizes the burden of winter. Finally, the speaker recalls that her grandfather

“always/ sipped his tea through a cube of sugar/ clenched in his teeth, the way/ he sipped his life

here, noisily,/ through all he remembered/ that might have been sweet in Grudnow” (Appendix A

Lines 31-36). While his grandfather did recount the difficulties and hardship of Grudnow,

symbolized by the bitter tea, he also remembered the joy and happiness that may have been in

Grudnow, symbolized by the sugar cube. The fact that the grandfather lived life noisily implies

that he embraced his life, and that he enjoyed the sweet and good as much as possible. However,

his acceptance of the hardship of his life is symbolized by the fact that he drinks the bitter tea in

the first place. Rather than disregarding the tea and eating only the sugar cube, he accepts both

the struggles and the joy in life and combines the two in order to attain a full flavor and an honest

memory of his past. While this poem discusses accepting the hardships in life, the next poem

emphasizes accepting loss in life.

The poem “I am Learning to Abandon the World” outlines the acceptance of loss

throughout the course of life. One critic says that one of Pastan’s themes is that life is able to

temporarily defeat death and it is too good to give up (Overview). There is too much joy in life to

surrender each time one encounters the loss that death symbolizes; therefore, one must accept it.

In the poem, the speaker notes how “the world has taken/ my father, my friends” (Appendix B

Lines 6-7). This implies how her friends and father have either died or are no longer estranged.

The idea of losing one’s friends and family also symbolizes the loss that one will experience

through the course of life. Further into the poem, “And every night I give my body up/ limb by

limb, working upwards/ across bone, towards the heart” (Appendix B Lines 10-12). This excerpt

communicates the desolation felt in the face of inevitable death, and ultimately, more loss. The

speaker knows that death is inevitable and acquiesces to it. However, at the end of the poem, the

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speaker says that “I [the speaker] take my body back/ the sun lays its warm muzzle on my lap/ as

if to make amends” (Appendix B Lines 19-21). The speaker accepts loss and the inevitability of

death and decides to continue to live her life. Similar to accepting life despite painful losses, the

next poem is about accepting unwanted change in life.

The poem “To a Daughter Leaving Home” expresses a need to accept the unwanted and

unforeseen changes in life. Greenbaum, a critic, says that the poem is about a child’s future

adulthood and departure from the mother’s life (Greenbaum). The mother in the poem has yet to

let go of her child and she does not desire the change in her lifestyle or in her child’s lifestyle.

Set in the pretense of a bicycle lesson, when the daughter pulls away from the speaker, she talks

about “my [the speaker] own mouth rounding/ in surprise when you pulled/ ahead down the

curved/ path of the park” (Appendix C Lines 7-10). This excerpt shows the unexpected nature of

the change. The mother was expecting to continue teaching her child about riding bikes and how

to live life. After the daughter pulled away, the mother noted that “you [the daughter] grew/

smaller, more breakable/ with distance” (Appendix C 15-17). Mrs. Pastan describes the great

amount of fear that the speaker felt with the change and the need to let go. She does not desire to

see her daughter hurt and wants to protect her child. The mother never wants the bike lesson,

being a metaphor for learning about life, to end. The final line of the poem consists of one word,

“Goodbye” (Appendix C Line 24). This emphasizes the acceptance of the mother. While this was

part of a larger sentence comparing her daughter’s hair to a handkerchief waving goodbye, the

only reason for the line break was to emphasize the closure that the poet wanted to bring to the

reader. The mother accepts the change that her daughter is undergoing, however unwanted or

unexpected.

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The messages about accepting the flaws in life that Pastan communicates are similarly

expressed in modern works of art. One group of artworks in specific, Project Err, deals directly

with the idea of greatness in flaws. Project Err prompted the laborers of mass production

facilities to produce an artistically flawed unit. The man who was the impetus for the project,

Jeremy Hutchison, is rather obscure, only claiming to be based out of London. It is apparent,

however, that he is still alive today, as he has a Twitter account. Jeremy Hutchison gathered the

artworks during the year of 2011 requesting flawed products to be used in an artistic function.

The Project Err includes things ranging from a backwards shovel, a toothless comb, and a

mangled chair. While there is a bit of humor or a satirical aura about the artworks, there is a

deeper message being communicated by them.

The whole of Project Err is based around the idea that there is still artistry and beauty in

the flawed objects in life. Jeremy Hutchison’s other works also are designed to make people

think. His art varies in style and doesn’t even seem to fall into a single specific style. Project Err

is an outcry for individualism in a world where the goal is to be identical. Almost all of the

works of Jeremy Hutchison praise the beauty of a flawed work. He takes the mistakes made by

workers and raises them up on a pedestal, praising their uniqueness. Jeremy Hutchison and Linda

Pastan both note the imperfections of the world. Similarly to Linda Pastan, Jeremy Hutchison

also recognizes that there is good in the world as well through the original design of the item. In

the end, Jeremy Hutchison and Linda Pastan both decide that life is better with both the good and

the bad.

Just as Linda Pastan’s message draws parallels to the visual arts, it also finds several

similarities in the literary arts. One book in particular, Jigsaw Soul by Mr. Scott Middlemist finds

a connection to Mrs. Pastan’s message as the main character struggles to accept the mistakes and

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tragedies of his life. In writing the novel, Mr. Middlemist draws primarily upon his experiences

as an infantry officer, but he also is influenced by his job as an English teacher. The novel is

formed upon pretense of PTSD, a disorder often witnessed in people who have served in the

armed forces. In addition, Mr. Middlemist uses many classical stories and mythologies,

reflecting his employment as an English teacher. The work mainly takes place in the present in

Iraq and an American mental ward, but it also takes place in during the events of November 11

in New York City and in San Francisco. Additionally, the book also takes place in the mythical

places of Camelot and Nordic Valhalla, as well as the burning inferno of hell. The main

character, Arthur Logan commits and witnesses terrible atrocities while serving in the field.

When he returns home, the trauma leads him to cause an accident killing hundreds of innocent

civilians. After being placed in a mental ward, Arthur Logan has to embark quests to recover the

lost parts of his soul and to accept the mistakes.

Scott Middlemist’s novel, similar to Linda Pastan’s poetry, communicates the need for

one to accept both their own mistakes and failings and to also accept their own positive traits and

successes they have made. During his quests, Arthur Logan receive help from George Patton.

However, Patton also has his own personal problems. Towards the end of the book Patton says

that “They’ve [his troops] been with me this whole time in The Scale. In my mind. In my heart.

Tonight, for the first time, I feel forgiven” (Middlemist 342). George Patton feels serious regret

for sending his troops to their death as well as for slapping and insulting some of his troops. He

regrets the shame he caused the troops he slapped, and he feels guilty for the men who died

under his command. However, he lets go of this guilt and shame and forgives himself, and

through this, opens himself up to being forgiven by the ghosts of his troops. Arthur Logan also

meets with his father who is good friends with Frank Lloyd Wright in the book. His father recalls

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how “Frank told me he wanted to go to his family. We came up several times, but he couldn’t

bring himself to go. He told me his biggest fear was facing his children” (Middlemist 356). Frank

Lloyd Wright was unsure and fearful of whether his children would forgive his mistakes. He,

with the help of Arthur and his father, comes to terms with this fear and moves on to the next

world. Finally, Arthur’s therapist, Dr. Simon, affirms that he should be released from mental care

at the end of the novel. She says that “Arthur Logan succeeded because he didn’t run from

responsibility. He carried it, came to terms with it, and was rewarded with the healing of his

psyche” (Middlemist 366). She tried to understand the burden of guilt and intense sadness that

Arthur had carried for the last two years. She aptly realized that Arthur had found peace with

himself, his flaws, his mistakes, and his shortcomings and accepted them. The characters in Mr.

Scott Middlemist’s book find and accept their flaws and become better and stronger people

because of this.

The literary arts, the visual arts, and above all poetry, have recognized the need for a

greater depth in education and within the arts. All of these different mediums have found the

same message they want to express; that life includes the bad, the flaws, the pain, and the sorrow

or the good, the perfections, the happiness, and the joy. Man has witnessed and experienced

some terrible things, but he has accepted these and decided to make a change for the better.

Similarly, people today need to realize that there is value in the bad in life. People struggle to

accept this fact, and they live much poorer lives because of it. This idea shapes everyone’s lives

and makes them stronger and more unique people. Linda Pastan’s work will be inspiring, leading

people to not only live better lives, but also to produce better art and literature to share with the

world.

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Appendix A

“Grudnow”, Linda Pastan (1986)

When he spoke of where he came from,

my grandfather could have been

clearing his throat

of that name, that town

sometimes Poland, sometimes Russia. 5

the borders pencilled in

with a hand as shaky as his.

He left, I heard him say,

because there was nothing there.

I understood what he meant 10

when I saw the photograph

of his people standing

against a landscape emptied

of crops and trees, scraped raw

by winter. Everything 15

was in sepia, as if the brown earth

had stained the faces,

stained even the air.

I would have died there, I think

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in childhood maybe 20

of some fever,

my face pressed for warmth

against a cow with flanks

like those of the great aunts

in the picture. Or later 25

I would have died of history

like the others, who dug

their stubborn heels into that earth,

heels as hard as the heels

of the bread my grandfather tore 30

from the loaf at supper. He always

sipped his tea through a cube of sugar

clenched in his teeth, the way

he sipped his life here, noisily,

through all he remembered 35

that might have been sweet in Grudnow.

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Appendix B

“I Am Learning To Abandon the World”, Linda Pastan (1981)

I am learning to abandon the world

before it can abandon me.

Already I have given up the moon

and snow, closing my shades

against the claims of white. 5

And the world has taken

my father, my friends.

I have given up melodic lines of hills,

moving to a flat, tuneless landscape.

And every night I give my body up 10

limb by limb, working upwards

across bone, towards the heart.

But morning comes with small

reprieves of coffee and birdsong.

A tree outside the window 15

which was simply shadow moments ago

takes back its branches twig

by leafy twig.

And as I take my body back

the sun lays its warm muzzle on my lap 20

as if to make amends.

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Appendix C

“To A Daughter Leaving Home”, Linda Pastan (1988)

When I taught you

at eight to ride

a bicycle, loping along

beside you

as you wobbled away

on two round wheels,

my own mouth rounding

in surprise when you pulled

ahead down the curved

path of the park,

I kept waiting

for the thud

of your crash as I

sprinted to catch up,

while you grew

smaller, more breakable

with distance,

pumping, pumping

for your life, screaming

with laughter,

the hair flapping

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behind you like a

handkerchief waving

goodbye.

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Appendix D

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Appendix E

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Appendix F

Project Err, Jeremy Hutchison 2011

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