Classic and Contemporary Poetry: Explained

Richard Aitson’s "Sun Is Blue" unfolds as a stark meditation on disconnection, cultural fragmentation, and personal despair. The poem employs surreal, disjointed imagery and repetition to evoke a sense of alienation, both from traditional cultural practices and from personal identity. The recurring motif—"The sun is blue"—serves as a metaphor for a world turned upside down, where natural and cultural orders are distorted, and the speaker is left grasping for meaning in an environment that feels foreign and disorienting.

The poem opens with the simple yet jarring declaration: "The sun is blue and I have forgotten all the words to make it red." This inversion of natural expectation immediately signals that something is profoundly wrong. The sun, a universal symbol of warmth, life, and continuity, is here described in a color traditionally associated with coldness, sadness, and detachment. The speaker’s inability to "make it red" suggests a loss of agency and a severing from cultural or spiritual traditions that might have once provided comfort or grounding. In many Indigenous cultures, red is a color tied to life, vitality, and ceremonial significance; thus, the speaker’s failure to summon the words to restore the sun’s natural color symbolizes a deeper loss of cultural connection and personal vitality.

Throughout the poem, Aitson employs repetition to reinforce this sense of despair. Phrases like "The sun is blue," and "I do not sing today, I do not sing tomorrow," highlight the speaker’s emotional paralysis and inability to engage with life in a meaningful way. Singing, often associated with expression, ritual, and community, becomes impossible, further emphasizing the speaker’s isolation. The line "My voice is dust and my eyes are blind" evokes imagery of decay and sensory deprivation, suggesting that the speaker is not only voiceless but also unable to perceive the world clearly. This degradation of voice and sight implies a deeper existential crisis, where even basic forms of human engagement—speaking and seeing—are compromised.

The poem oscillates between surreal, almost dreamlike imagery and grounded references to cultural elements. The mention of "Eagles and hawks"—birds often associated with spiritual power and vision in many Native traditions—introduces a tension between belief and skepticism. While these creatures "make me listen to chants," the speaker admits, "but I do not believe in that way." This line is pivotal, as it reveals the speaker’s estrangement not just from broader society but also from traditional spiritual practices. The declaration, "It is evil," met with the reply, "it is dead," further underscores this rupture, suggesting that what was once sacred is now either corrupted or lifeless in the speaker’s eyes.

Aitson layers the poem with haunting, disjointed images that reflect both personal and cultural dislocation. "Old wrinkled meat women carry guns in their hair," and "Children without homes follow me, but I am hiding," create a dystopian landscape where figures from different stages of life—elders and children—are portrayed in unsettling, fragmented ways. The line about "Old wrinkled meat women" is particularly jarring, reducing human figures to decaying flesh, while the children represent lost innocence or displaced youth, trailing the speaker who is himself in retreat.

Nature, too, is presented in a disordered, almost hostile manner: "Horses without riders eat the clay," and "Blood is in the water bag, my mouth is dry." These lines depict a world where animals act unnaturally and essential resources like water are tainted, contributing to the speaker’s pervasive sense of desolation. The reference to "Tobacco smoke reeks with the odor of cedar and sage" ties into Native ceremonial practices, as both cedar and sage are traditionally used for purification and spiritual protection. However, in the context of the poem, even these sacred elements seem corrupted, their scents mingling with the speaker’s despair rather than offering solace.

Family and identity emerge as complicated themes. The speaker recalls his grandfather, who also declared, "The sun is blue," suggesting that this sense of dislocation is intergenerational, passed down like an inherited wound. The line "My father had Mexican eyes" introduces a layered identity, hinting at mixed heritage and the complexities that come with navigating multiple cultural identities. This theme is deepened by the provocative statement, "A stolen woman cannot be my wife, but a stolen child may be my son." Here, Aitson grapples with themes of possession, belonging, and the legacy of historical traumas, such as forced assimilation and displacement.

The speaker’s oscillation between resignation and a latent, suppressed anger is evident in the poem’s closing lines. "Shells decorate my shirt. I paint my face for battle." Despite the pervasive sense of hopelessness, there are vestiges of resistance in these images. The shells and face paint, traditionally used in preparation for conflict or ceremony, suggest that the speaker is not entirely defeated, even if the battle is now internal or symbolic. However, the statement "There is no reason to fear dogs" complicates this interpretation, perhaps alluding to an absence of external threats compared to the overwhelming internal turmoil.

The surreal, almost grotesque imagery continues with "Turtles eat women when they are of no use," a line that seems to symbolize the consumption or erasure of women’s roles and bodies once they are deemed unproductive. This line, like many others in the poem, resists straightforward interpretation, instead contributing to the overall atmosphere of distortion and existential dread.

The poem concludes as it began, with the refrain: "The sun is blue." This cyclical structure emphasizes the inescapability of the speaker’s condition. Words continue to fail, and the natural world remains inverted, reflecting the speaker’s ongoing struggle to find meaning or redemption in a landscape marked by loss and disconnection.

Aitson’s "Sun Is Blue" is a powerful meditation on cultural dislocation, personal despair, and the complexities of identity. The poem’s fragmented structure and surreal imagery mirror the psychological and spiritual fragmentation of the speaker, offering a vivid, unsettling portrait of a world where traditional sources of meaning—family, culture, nature—have become estranged or corrupted. Through repetition and dissonant imagery, Aitson captures the pervasive sense of alienation that can arise from historical trauma and cultural disintegration, while leaving open the possibility of resistance, even if only symbolically. The sun remains blue, but the act of naming it as such becomes a form of bearing witness, a refusal to turn away from the reality of dislocation and despair.

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