The Art of John Ashberry (1988)

   The Art of John Ashberry

     The poetry of John Ashberry can be very difficult and discouraging for the reader,
whether student, ribboned scholar, or poetry enthusiast; but when understood, the sense
of accomplishment is great and the reward exceeds the migraine. Ashberry's style is one
of cool calculation; every word seems tailored to suit his intention, which is almost
always hidden through use of various literary devices. The free-standing Ashberry poem,
tackled one-on-one by a reader, can seem an unyielding mass of academic theory; too
cerebral to enjoy, too fortified and resolute, too lofty. But in reading and studying
several of Ashberry's poems, one gains momentum, recognizes familiar images and
concepts, learns to identify friendly niches where the poem can be grabbed and event
-ually scaled. This was my experience in analyzing several of John Ashberry's poems.
With each re-reading his poems expand and reveal new possibilities; this is a character
-istic of great art. And Ashberry's interests in art reveal the complexity of his mind.

     Art is primarily a source of communication for humans, but that certainly doesn't mean
that it should be "easy." When an artistic expression is left "open-ended;" that is,
when its possibilities are at their greatest, then that "art" is best utilizing the relationship
between the artist and his audience. When the artist presents a message and his
intended message is understood by another person, a connection is made. The reader
of poetry, the poem, and the poet are brought together in the artistic experience of
communication. Ashberry creates poems that are at once precise and vague; poems that
conceal as much as they reveal; poems that always hint toward further inspection.

     In five of Ashberry's poems: "Forties Flick," "The One Thing That Can Save America,"
"Syringa," "Knocking Around," and "Paradoxes and Oxymorons," we can see his interest
in the puzzle-making process of art, and understand his valuation of art as a tool for
human communication. Consistently seen in his work is the concept of human life
itself becoming an art form: our "lives" built and arranged as we interpret reality and
meaning.

     The artificial nature of cinema shows people's lust for mystery and our playful ways
of attaining knowledge and meaning. In "Forties Flick," the reader is instantly lured on
by the image of shadows and a nearly nude woman: "In bra and panties she sidles to
the window/Zip! Up with the blind. A fragile street scene offers itself. (L.5,6) The
alluring quality of the romantic movie is one of concealment as much as revelation;
the reader of this poem does not know who this woman is, yet we see her scantily
clad, briefly; and then "the blind comes down slowly, the slats are slowly tilted up."
(L.8) The reader is whisked away from the movie to the poem at hand, to his reality.

     The attraction of the movie's scene is reliant on concealment: not knowing exactly
the destination but enjoying the scenery. The poem explains to the reader that it is
"all that is unsaid" about the mysterious woman that draws us back to her; like her
character, the movie itself must know what "...important details to leave out." (L15)
As with all art, we must recognize the artificiality of the construct; things are presented
in half-light so we do not leave our seats for popcorn, fearing we will miss the
"important" part. We want meaning but it should not be too easy; and then the poem
refers to itself in the line, "...yet now all over the page....(L 18)."

     In incorporating a message or statement, the external becomes internalized:
"....the indoors with the outside becoming part of you....(L. 19)."  Thus, the events of
life constantly add to the sum of a person; their "lives" are constructs of their life's
happenings. In this analogy, people are the ultimate art. And death, like nearing the
end of the movie, or the poem's conclusion, is yet another vague mystery: "...death,/
The background, dark vine at the edge of the porch (L.20-21) The dark vine extends
beyond our physical view, but draws us on, open-ended.

     Several of these concepts are developed further is other poems that were written
later. In "Syringa," music is symbolic of life in that "...you can not isolate a note of it/
And say it is good or bad./ You must wait until it is over (L. 5-7)." Every event life adds
to our "lives" just as a frame advances the movie or a stanza adds to the poem's whole.
And just as things "too real to be of concern" are artificial, the straightforward historical
rendering of life is unimportant in the long run; unimportant because we do not learn
from the past:  "No use standing...as the whole wheel/ of recorded history flashes past,
unable to utter an intelligent/ Comment on themost thought-provoking element in its
train (L. 19-20)." With history represented as a circling wheel, people are forever dumb
to the past.

     As history, or cold fact "flashes past," so does poetry according to Ashberry. He likens
the poem" to "...a bad comet/ Screaming hate and disaster, but so turned inward/
That the meaning, good or other/ Can never become known (L.68-71)." Whether
Ashberry chose "disaster" for its latin root "aster" is unknown to the reader; he is caught
watching the flowing trail of images which build like a singer's chant: "The singer thinks/
Constructively, builds up his chant in progressive stages/ Like a skyscraper...(L.71-73)."
As we read on, Ashberry uses the term "stellification," which  is presumably for the few
who wait until the movie's end to thumb up or nay.

     As with much of Ashberry's poetry, the internal workings incorporate the experience
of reading that must be occurring. That is, he illustrates meaning within a poem by pointing
to the process of discovering "meaning." He describes this in "Syringa" as events that
"...happen along, bumping into other things, getting along/ Somehow (L.14-15)."  Thus,
"living" and searching for "meaning" within a poem or song is very similar: one goes
"Knocking Around."

     Things like Art Deco and "tulip mania" seem to come around on the wheel of history:
"Both things we know about and recall/ With a certain finesse as though they were respon
-sible/ For part of life (L.12-13)." But in actuality, they are part of our "lives," not life
itself. And though "tulip mania" is part of this poem, it is not central; the reader bounces
off its mention and goes on. The concepts of connection and linking occur frequently in
Ashbery's poems, pointing out his literary device of that same idea. He begins "Knocking
Around" by telling the reader he hopes to start a "new chain" by "drinking here." As there
is no specific place mentioned, we assume he means the "present now" as "here." Later
in the poem, the concept of time arises, and he refers to the calendar as "a chain of days"
that we make ourselves. Things die for awhile, then return; for Ashberry, death is space,
or form, without time; or, "a jar with no lid (L.35)."

     The idea of connecting relationships comes around again; life and death are as jar and
lid; our life contains our "lives" and with the opening of "closed" life, death enters. It is
an interdependent relationship, the poem explains, "like the snow and snowshovel."
Like a person reaching meaning through moving words, knocking around.

     The relationship between audience, poem, and poet is explored in one of Ashberry's
most famously difficult poems, "Paradoxes and Oxymorons." It is a poem which must be
reread several times; and when understood, the poem's simplicity unravels before you
and you wonder what the problem was to begin with. The poem is built of paradoxical
statements from the beginning: "This is concerned with language on a very plain level./
Look at it talking to you (L. 1,2)." Of course, the reader knows he is in trouble; how can a
poem "be" concerned? The visual experience of printed words is paradoxical in regard to
human communication; words "talk" to you only in the symbolic sense. This notion is
similarly expressed in "The One Thing That Can Save America:" "The quirky things that
happen to me, and I tell you,/ And you instantly know what I mean (L. 30-31)." Of course
Ashberry knows his poetry is not that easy; simplicity can be very difficult.

     Subjectivity in poetry, as in all human perception of reality, must be recognized in order
to relate. As Ashberry notes, " I know I braid too much my own/ Snapped off perceptions
of things as they come to me./ They are private and always will be(L.24-6)." So the difficulty
in communication, as in art, lies in the fact that reality is subjective, as is "meaning" or
"fact."

     Reaching meaning in poetry is a connecting of minds, as Ashberry notes in "Paradoxes:"
"You have it but you don't have it./ You miss it, it misses you. You miss each other (L. 3-4)"
The frequent use of pronouns creates a vagueness that deepens the poem's scope; it
remains mysterious and seemingly complex as the poem at hand is referred to as "it." The
paradoxical notion of simplicity being complex illustrates the problem of communication
through art. Meaning is an external value; it can be applied to anything according to one's
perceptions of reality. Ashberry uses a pun to illustrate the depth of the internal, asking
"what is a plain level;" he then uses the word "play" which has many meanings. Not only
does it mean "interaction" and "drama," it also points out the fun the artist has in masking
his message. The poem explains that "...I consider play to be/ A deeper outside thing, a
dreamed role-pattern....without proof. Open-ended (L. 8-11)."

     The pun of "play" being deep, while a "plain level" is supposedly flat or shallow is
extended by the pun on theater, drama; a "role-pattern." It is the "play" in the poem that
gives the mystery and depth of meaning, which is fragile and dependent on the unstable
connecting relationship of artist and audience: "And before you know/ It gets lost in the
steam and chatter of typewriters (L. 11,12)."  The importance of pronouns is emphasized
by the line's specific break; the vagueness requires the reader to re-examine, creating
complexity through simplicity. The poem refers to itself in saying "It has been played once
more (L. 12)."

     The transiency of meaning is illustrated in the final stanza as Ashberry utilizes the
vagueness of pronouns which refer to many things at once. Human subjective reality is
responsible for this in part as the artist's product conforms to its audience: "...you exist
only/ To tease me into doing it on your level, and then you aren't there/ Or have adopted
a different attitude (L. 12-14)." The audience is part of the poetic experience of meaning
and like an actor can change the interpretation by reading with a different "attitude" or
"reality." And when the artist, his art, and the audience align their perceptions and under
-stand one meaning, then all three are one: " And the poem/ Has set me softly down
beside you (L. 14-15)." And "you" are a construct of all you experience.

     Thus, people can be seen as the ultimate art. Their lives are constructs of all the events
that happen to them, while their "life" is a deeper, natural entity. The artificiality of human
lives is expressed in our art. Theater, movies, music, painting, and poetry all depend on
alignment of the perceptions of the artist, his art, and the audience. Vagueness in art creates
depth; the open-ended presentation of meaning creates mystery and involves the audience
in a process of understanding. Art is relevant to humans in this aspect as meaning in life is
an external entity; the capacity to "be exemplary, like a star" is always there. One must
simply wait for the end of the production "to know."


Forest Bloodgood
Modern Poetry, Dr. Gridley
Univ. of Kansas
Incredibly Late  A minus