Stepping Into "Whoville"

For last weeks’ set of poems I realize that I hadn’t stopped to consider a “who,” and only used the voice in relation to an expression of feeling, but I want to examine the who as I’m not sure what it is in a condensed context or a broad context. If we look at poems like “Grown Men” “The Great Wait” and “We are Not Responsible” we get different types of who’s. “We Are Not Responsible” deliberately takes on the voice of the oppressor and uses this perspective as an instrument to comment on certain injustices. The problem is that this oppressor can take on different forms at once that does not solidify a “who” as this poem can be taken on at different levels of the system. The “who” in this case could easily be the police, the general white population, the government - but at no point does Mullen ever specify who is speaking.

In that same breath, because of this conceptual “who” and the historical context of the content, we have a very clear understanding of the who that’s being addressed and even then it’s a who that’s capable of taking on many forms. Within this poem I could see every group that has been wronged by the overarching system. It’s a who that’s unified but also disjointed because the only thing these groups have in common at the end of this poem, is the oppression they’ve lived with by the hand of that voice.

My assertion being that here we are not given a who is speaking but rather a who is being spoken to; we’re given all the information we need to place certain identities as Mullen goes through a timeline of grievances for every minority group,  but there is no unity on behalf of the implied oppressor or the oppressed. Of course you can argue then that the later are united by their experiences and the former are united in their beliefs (however false) but with what we’re given I can’t necessarily ascribe a “who”. (Which in itself is somewhat an oxymoron, because common knowledge tells us that the who is a specific group of people. In the same way that saying “they” or “you all” with a social context implies a group of people. What I’d prefer to say is that I commend Mullen for reacting in a sort of opposite way. While “Dear White America” confronts white people, she just takes the voice of them, which when read by a white person would - in my opinion - strength the message of the piece)