Setting, and Memory Are Cornerstone

¶ … setting, and memory are cornerstone poetic devices. In Charles Simic's work, setting creates an atmosphere and mood that permeates poems like "Butcher Shop," "Cockroach," "Tapestry," "Evening," "The Inner Man," "Fear," "Summer Morning," and "Dismantling the Silence." Each of Simic's poems demonstrates the importance of place and setting on tone and mood, allowing the essence of each poem to emerge.

The titular butcher shop in "Butcher Shop" is relatively straightforward in terms of how a place or setting can be metaphorical. Butchering is not even symbolic -- it is a literal act of tearing into flesh, using the tools of the trade to subdue, dominate, and control. Using imagery of "great rivers and oceans of blood," Simic shows how place and setting alone can capture the theme of a poem. A butcher shop is a place of bone, blood, and death. While omnivores depend on butchers to acquire meat, the malicious prey upon other human beings using gross acts of butchery.

"Tapestry" is a metaphor for human life and society, using place, space, and setting as core elements. The titular tapestry "hangs from heaven to earth." It encompasses a wide range of human experiences including "snow falling over a charging cavalry," "women planting rice," and "an evil-eyed woman spitting into a pail of milk." Behind the tapestry is "plenty of empty space." The empty space speaks of the potency of human potential. Human beings have the potential for both good and bad. Moreover, Simic makes a statement about homogenization and globalization in the poem "Tapestry." The last stanza of the poem describes a man going into a barbershop who gets a shave "to make him look like everyone else."

In "Evening," Simic uses natural imagery as the metaphor-rich setting. A snail is the symbol of "stillness," which is a prevailing condition in the poem. In the second stanza, the narrator states, "Let all be simple. Let all stand still / Without final direction." A broader metaphysical and existential statement is made, too, as the narrator notes "that which brings you into the world / to take you away at death / Is one and the same." The natural universe, including snails and the grass they feed on, is a setting rich with meaning and metaphor.

Poems like "Cockroach" and "The Inner Man" have more global, rather than specific, settings that nevertheless allow the theme of the poem to emerge. For example, cockroach is about personal and collective identity, which is naturally linked to geography and place when it comes to ethnicity and nationality. In "The Inner Man," the narrator also refers to global themes of setting, place, and space. "We poke the same / Ugly mug / at the world." The actual hallmarks of setting are nebulous in "The Inner Man," but the atmosphere and mood still depend on the cultural meanings embedded in the poem. In "Fear," a tree is more of a motif or symbol than it is an element of place or setting.