"The Writer" by Richard Wilbur
When I first came across this poem, it shocked me so much I wondered if I’d understood it properly. Now, I count it amongst my favorites. I hope you will, too. (It’s a longer one than any of the previously featured poems, but goodness it’s worth it!)
The Writer
by Richard Wilbur
In her room at the prow of the house
Where light breaks, and the windows are tossed with linden,
My daughter is writing a story.
I pause in the stairwell, hearing
From her shut door a commotion of typewriter-keys
Like a chain hauled over a gunwale.
Young as she is, the stuff
Of her life is a great cargo, and some of it heavy:
I wish her a lucky passage.
But now it is she who pauses,
As if to reject my thought and its easy figure.
A stillness greatens, in which
The whole house seems to be thinking,
And then she is at it again with a bunched clamor
Of strokes, and again is silent.
I remember the dazed starling
Which was trapped in that very room, two years ago;
How we stole in, lifted a sash
And retreated, not to affright it;
And how for a helpless hour, through the crack of the door,
We watched the sleek, wild, dark
And iridescent creature
Batter against the brilliance, drop like a glove
To the hard floor, or the desk-top,
And wait then, humped and bloody,
For the wits to try it again; and how our spirits
Rose when, suddenly sure,
It lifted off from a chair-back,
Beating a smooth course for the right window
And clearing the sill of the world.
It is always a matter, my darling,
Of life or death, as I had forgotten. I wish
What I wished you before, but harder.
The things we most notice on our first reading, what I call the “pre-reading,” are certainly the loving feelings of a father towards his daughter as she embarks on a difficult task, the sound of the typewriter, and the violent description of the bird’s attempt at escape through the bedroom window.
Here is what I’ve got for a paraphrase:
I pause on the stairs and hear my daughter writing a story in her bedroom, where the window faces the sunshine and the linden trees. I can hear the typewriter keys through the closed door; they sound like a chain being drawn over a ship. Even though she is young, her life experiences give her a lot of material to write about, and some of it is very difficult. I wish her well in her task. Now, she pauses in her writing, almost as if she is rejecting my well wishes—they are too easily given in comparison with her current struggle. The silence falls over the whole house, as if the house itself were thinking too, until suddenly she begins typing again. Then, the keys are silent again.
I remember the bird that was trapped in that same room two years before, and how my daughter and I ran inside to open a window, then ran out, so we wouldn’t scare it any more than it already was. We watched it helplessly for an hour through a crack in the door, as its beautiful form tried and failed many times to leave through the window, battering itself against the windowpane and falling hard, like a glove. It would lie battered and bloody where it fell, gathering the strength to try again. And, how elated we were when the bird finally soared out of the right window confidently.
I had forgotten, my darling, that these lofty pursuits are always as important as life and death. I wish you well again, but more fervently because I understand how difficult it must be.
In “The Writer,” a father hopes for his daughter’s success in writing just as the two of them hoped for the successful escape of a trapped starling two years prior. In both cases, he stands quietly in the same location, knowing that the task being attempted within the room is simultaneously as important as life and death, as well as something he can have no part in. While the first impulse of any parent is usually to help their child succeed in their pursuits, the father in this poem knows that this attempt at writing is something his daughter must do on her own. Whether her story fails and drops to the ground, “humped and bloody,” or succeeds in “clearing the sill of the world,” presumably launching her into a career of successful writing, is completely up to her. The only thing he can do, and the right thing to do, is to recognize the lofty importance of her pursuit, that it is “a matter of life or death,” and wish her the best.
By comparing his daughter’s typing to the repeated failures and eventual success of the beautiful starling, the reader feels some of what the father imagines to be his daughter’s pain in the writing process, and his knowledge that, with any creative pursuit, there is a large likelihood of many failures before success, if that success ever actually happens. After all, “the stuff of her life is a great cargo, and some of it heavy…” It can’t be easy to write about, especially knowing that the most likely outcome of a first foray into writing is failure.
The genius juxtaposition between the tender, deep love of a father for his daughter and the violent, painful failures of the trapped starling allows the reader some insight not only into the creative process, but also into one of the harder parts of parenting: allowing your child to succeed or fail on their own, and accepting the role of supporter in either event.
If I imagine myself watching that starling, my first impulse would be to pick it up while it is “humped and bloody” on the ground, and assist it in getting back outside… Just like my first instinct with my children is always to assist them. What Wilbur writes about here, though, is about when that assistance is actually a hindrance, and when it is the right time to let go, knowing that you have already given all the tools and love you had to give.
And he does it masterfully, with a subtle command over touching and shocking imagery.
You can watch Richard Wilbur read “The Writer” below, if you’d like. I love his sonorous voice.