Nature of the Poetic Turn, the Structural

¶ … nature of the poetic turn, the structural component of a poem, which may occur multiple times in a poem, in which your expectations are upended or displaced, in which you are surprised or affected by the direction the poet is taking. What is the purpose of the turn and how is it accomplished? Why is it an important part of a contemporary poem and how does it function particularly in the poem you selected for this week's DB. For many of you, you might begin with the poem and discuss how it sets its reader up for the turn, delivers the turn -- or turns -- and to what effect and use that discussion to allow you to reflect on the questions you've been asked.

Miguel Pinero's poem 'A lower east side' is about his pride in being a citizen of the Lower East Side and his subsequent desire that his ashes be scattered there.

The entire poem marks a turn. The Lower East Side is stereotyped for its high level of crime, misery, and decrepitude. We expect habitants to wish to feel the place and that they only live there due to their inability to escape. We are surprised to hear that they are sane survivors.

Pinero dents our accustomed way of thinking about the place by telling us that he is actually proud to belong to the East Side and, not only that, would want to live and be buried nowhere else. We are, as it were, caught off guard and attention caught, not by the poem, but by his statement.

This is the intention of the turn: to hold us, make us wonder, keep our attention from wandering off.

In today's world of TV, Internet, and heaps of diversions ate every turn, the traditional poem is insufficient in holding the contemporary person's attention. We need more than words and semantics. We need some startling strategies that twist us around just as we are about to doze off. Contemporary literature, such as that of Pinero, therefore, startles us not only by harsh words and images but also by unexpected twists. Just as we think that we are about to fall into the routine, the author 'grabs us by the hair' and yanks out of the pit of the predictable into the unexpected.

Pinero punctuates his poem with other turns breaking all of our stereotypes.

We tend for instance to associate 'hustlers & suckers' with dangerous sick elements of society whom we wish to avoid. Likewise, 'faggots & freaks 'are not our ideal society. Pinero gives them another meaning and actually seems to exult their presence:

From Houston to 14th Street

from Second Avenue to the mighty D

here the hustlers & suckers meet the faggots & freaks will all get high on the ashes that have been scattered

thru the Lower East Side.

Similarly, too, unlike others, Pinero reports that:

fancy cars & pimps' bars & juke saloons & greasy spoons make my spirits fly

Places 'the Might D' and elements of society 'fancy cars & pimps' bars & juke saloons" that disturb others are turned around in Pinero's poem as people and places that are truly alive and whose presence lends to the upbeat glory of the Lower East Side.

Furthermore, most people may be ashamed of their crime-ridden past. Not so Pinero.

In another turn, he tells us:

A thief, a junkie I've been committed every known sin

Contrary to expectation, he does not seem to be ashamed of his sins. He accepts them. Neither is he scandalized by his region. He loves it too. Stepping aside from social conventions, Pinero seems to tell us that he feel proud of his history and certainly proud of his notorious region:

I am the Philosopher of the Criminal Mind

a dweller of prison time

a cancer of Rockefeller's ghettocide this concrete tomb is my home to belong to survive you gotta be strong.