Classic and Contemporary Poetry: Explained

Robert Wrigley’s “Wait” explores the complex, almost ritualistic act of hunting, embedding it within a richly textured landscape of moral ambiguity and reverence for life. Through meticulously chosen imagery and deliberate pacing, the poem navigates the emotional terrain of the hunter, caught between the appreciation of nature’s beauty and the finality of taking life.

The opening lines introduce the rifle, its "wood and steel beautiful," as a mechanical marvel and an object of admiration. Wrigley focuses on the "slickness with which all the moving parts slide open and shut," elevating the firearm beyond a tool of destruction to a symbol of precision and human ingenuity. Yet this reverence for the rifle contrasts with the moral weight of its purpose: to kill. The juxtaposition sets the tone for the tension between the hunter’s aesthetic and ethical considerations.

As the hunter observes the doe, the poem slows to match his careful, deliberate breathing. The imagery becomes intimate and serene: "the heart pumps and the lungs, she being absolutely at ease and grazing, exchange the same mountain air he also breathes." This shared act of breathing creates a fleeting unity between predator and prey, emphasizing the fragility and interconnectedness of life. The scope’s crosshairs, while a tool of precision, symbolize the thin boundary between existence and death, and the hunter?s moral struggle within that boundary.

Wrigley’s language captures the physical and emotional aftermath of the hunt with unflinching detail. The anticipated "clean kill" evokes both a sense of accomplishment and a profound grief. The hunter knows he will be "bathed in her blood and intimate with the then-stilled machinery of her living," an image that juxtaposes the visceral reality of death with an almost sacred acknowledgment of life’s mechanisms. The "buttery liver" and "probably full bladder" are not sanitized or romanticized but instead presented with raw honesty, grounding the act in its biological and ethical gravity.

The forest floor becomes a site of transformation, where death feeds life. The hunter reflects on how the doe’s remains will nourish "the coyotes and the black-and-white custodial birds," a recognition of nature’s cyclical processes. This acknowledgment does not absolve him but rather situates his actions within a broader ecological context, where loss is both inevitable and necessary.

The poem’s title, “Wait”, encapsulates its thematic core. The act of waiting is both practical and philosophical, as the hunter delays the shot to align his breath with the doe’s, to absorb the scene’s intricacies, and to grapple with the moral weight of his decision. The snow falling on the doe’s shoulders, the shrubs, and even "the barrel of the rifle itself" underscores the passage of time, the fragility of the moment, and the inevitability of the act. The hunter’s waiting becomes an act of mindfulness, a means of fully inhabiting the ethical and emotional complexity of the hunt.

The poem concludes by circling back to the hunter’s earlier discovery of the "patch of long and still-green mountain fescue" and the elevated spot from which he now aims. This return to the beginning reinforces the inevitability of the hunt, shaped by careful planning and patience. Yet, the final lines leave the reader suspended, unsure whether the hunter has taken the shot or chosen to continue waiting. This ambiguity mirrors the hunter’s inner conflict, where reverence for life and the necessity of survival coexist uneasily.

“Wait” is a meditation on the tension between human dominion over nature and our profound connection to it. Wrigley’s vivid imagery and measured pacing draw the reader into the hunter’s perspective, inviting us to confront our own views on life, death, and our place within the natural world. The poem refuses easy answers, instead lingering in the complexity of the moment, much like the hunter himself. It is a powerful exploration of mortality, responsibility, and the beauty that persists even in the face of inevitable loss.

Copyright (c) 2025 PoetryExplorer

Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!

Other Poems of Interest...