The "who" ("who" I'm identifying as the speaker) in Haley Laningham's "The Valley and Family Tectonic," is created in this moment of the Northridge Earthquake. Set at this specific moment, the natural stress of earth pressing itself underground is related to the stress the speaker's family endure due to the father's drinking.
Structurally, the poem's long lines and associative clauses lend itself to tumbling, there isn't much time to pause when one is reading through the stanzas or memories, which reflects the motion of earthquake and aftershock. The last two stanzas are only one sentence and it all melds together into one moment of longing in the speaker: longing for peace, longing for stability that isn't only surface deep.
To think of poems winding and unwinding around a wooden spool, the spool here would be the blind thrust fault--invisible split--that resounds outward into the home. I read the intensely personal moments of "broken foundation" as almost a way for the earth to halt human failings and suffering, to draw attention to the stars. But, in this metaphor, the speaker portrays the father's dysfunction as a natural occurrence, a series of actions that will spread the family, like continents, further apart from one another.
I believe that the speaker in this poem is widening the scope of his subjectivity to encompass society in general, and how "every other beloved delusion / crumbled within the panic" (172). In the aftershock, the materialistic productions of LA (Disneyland, television, sports) come to a standstill and are stuck looking toward the heavens for guidance (or possibly entertainment). This is an ambiguous epiphany moment: a needed respite from ceaseless production and time for self-reflection, but also a destructive ceasing, and a rumbling that seems to be foreshadowed in the speaker's family home.
This poem collapses inward and also pushes outward: the micro- and macro- scales blur together in time and in sentence. I believe the speaker needs this broader context, to find themself in this wider landscape of possibility, because there is at least moments of comfort he can find in this ambiguity.
Avren, your analysis of this poem is beautiful. I was also struck by the juxtaposition of the personal and communal crumbling, and I love how you describe "the father's dysfunction as a natural occurrence." The disruptiveness (and ability to bring the family together) of the earthquake may be temporary, but the "longing for peace, longing for stability that isn't only surface deep," as you nicely put it, is palpable throughout the poem.
ReplyDeleteWhen you write, "the macro and micro scales blur together in time and sentence," it strikes me as a brilliant observation because so many of the poems we have read blend together critiques of systems of oppression and personal experience. Syntactically, this occurs- translating the reality one experiences into language, which is such an abstract yet specific concept.
ReplyDeleteYou really nailed the movement of this poem. I was so happy to see a real schema of the progression. Connecting these notions to specific lines makes us understand the emotional and intellectual impact . The inward push makes a lot of sense, but i would like to connect to the "collapse" a bit more.
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