They pointed me out on the highway, and they said
'That man has a curious way of holding his head.'
They pointed me out on the beach; they said 'That man
Will never become as we are, try as he can.'
They pointed me out at the station, and the guard
Looked at me twice, thrice, thoughtfully & hard.
I took the same train that the others took,
To the same place. Were it not for that look
And those words, we were all of us the same.
I studied merely maps. I tried to name
The effects of motion on the traveller's,
I watched the couple I could see, the curse
And blessings of that couple, their destination,
The deception practiced on them at the station,
Their courage. When the train stopped and they knew
The end of their journey, I descended too.
'That man has a curious way of holding his head.'
They pointed me out on the beach; they said 'That man
Will never become as we are, try as he can.'
They pointed me out at the station, and the guard
Looked at me twice, thrice, thoughtfully & hard.
I took the same train that the others took,
To the same place. Were it not for that look
And those words, we were all of us the same.
I studied merely maps. I tried to name
The effects of motion on the traveller's,
I watched the couple I could see, the curse
And blessings of that couple, their destination,
The deception practiced on them at the station,
Their courage. When the train stopped and they knew
The end of their journey, I descended too.
John Berryman’s, “the Traveler,” is a poem about a nomadic man who is always different from the people around him. He takes notice of what people say about him and mimics their actions to try to fit in but it doesn’t always work.
ReplyDeleteThe poem starts out the first three stanzas with solid evidence of judgement. “They pointed at me” he says, and then recalls what each group or did towards him. The first group of people passed him in a car and said, “that man has a curious way of holding his head” (line 2) the next group stated that he would never amount to anything.The guard at the station in stanza three didn’t say a word, but took a double-take at the traveller and stared.
The judgement these people made on the traveller was probably innocent, and they never assumed he would here them, but he did, it effected him and he tried to change his ways because of it. I relate his reaction to their comments to the stares and whispering an obese person get when they walk into a restaurant—we don’t think they hear or see us but they are very aware of the attention.
In line 7 the man states that people will stare as though he is odd even though they are on the same train, to the same place, the only difference between him and them is that he merely“studies maps”. When one “studies maps” it could be because they are on a journey, or they are homeless, looking for the next place to stop. This is against the norm of society, which could be the cause of the unwanted attention, but Berryman seemed to think that it was normal.
In the end Berryman tries to give the message that it’s human nature to judge people we don’t know. It’s our minds way of protecting ourselves. If someone seems out of the ordinary, his or her actions may be as well. Judgment allows us to keep our distance and ensure that being naïve isn’t the last thing we do.