When approaching literature, I tend to take a cultural approach to its analysis. When an author approaches a topic and introduces it into their oeuvre, they are addressing it from a stance that has been directly influenced by a disequilbrium in their cultural surroundings. A writer must react to this upset in their society by not only addressing the intrusion or disruption, but by providing suggestions as to how they feel it could be resolved to restore the order which had governed their society previously. The constant intrusions into everyday life have caused a disconnect with the stability of certain institutions and figures that the general public so enjoyed in the past. All writing is as a direct result of this schism.
The poem that I chose to analyze is Blues by bp Nichol (McMahan, 465). This is a spatial poem consisting of several iterations of the word "love", all with letters rearranged, added or removed in some way. The word in some variation is featured once per line and is staggered in position from the rest of the iterations. These descending and staggering qualities suggest the instability of Nichols' love and its likelihood to crumble unexpectedly, leaving one "blue", as the title suggests. Another spatial aspect is the letter "e," which crosses through the poem in a diagonal line. The "e" represents the ecstacy that the author felt upon being struck by love initially, the fact that it is crossing through, or piercing, love signifies that this consumed him initially, but ultimately blinded him from the reality of his union.
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