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| Image from http://www.invisiblebooks.com/Duchamp.htm |
Nude Descending a Staircase
BY X J KENNEDY
Toe after toe, a snowing flesh,
a gold of lemon, root and rind,
she sifts in sunlight down the stairs
with nothing on. Nor on her mind.
We spy beneath the banister
a constant thresh of thigh on thigh;
her lips imprint the swinging air
that parts to let her parts go by.
One-woman waterfall, she wears
her slow descent like a long cape
and pausing on the final stair,
collects her motions into shape.
© 1985 by X. J. Kennedy. Used by permission of the author.
Source: Poetry (January 1960).
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Uncannily, except for the judgement of the nude as "empty-headed," the poem pretty much depicts Duchamp's Nude Descending a Staircase: its fragmentation, its discordance in an attempt to portray motion.
It was pointed out during the video discussion that Kennedy's poem was an argument for a "return to normalcy" (traditional, recognizable poetry?) and a rejection of the fragmentation of modernism. It was also argued that his satire falls flat because he ends up satirizing the object of the poem (which is offensive, to say the least!). I agree.
But I can also understand where Kennedy is coming from. Like a Fragonnard waiting beneath the bannister, instead of being greeted with something sensual, the speaker is greeted with "parts." A disappointed voyeur! He might be saying that this fragmentation has reduced the woman into pieces of herself, losing her humanity and any thought that might have been on her mind. It might be a critique of the almost surgical dismemberment of what was once recognizable. At the end of the poem, the speaker collects the woman for us, the readers, "into (one) shape."
In terms of aesthetic, I would rather explore than go back to a "safe" and recognizable form. Well, that's just me. I can appreciate that form, for sure, but I want to seek out a voice that comes from its age and circumstances, its questions and experiences of the world.
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