Classic and Contemporary Poetry: Explained

Bob Hicok’s “It’s Not So Much the Heat as the Stupidity” is a striking example of his ability to blend conversational absurdity with biting social commentary. The poem unfolds in a single, unbroken sentence, its syntax unraveling in an anxious, self-conscious stream that mirrors the speaker’s unease about both speech itself and the political and ethical implications of what is being said. Hicok employs a disarmingly casual tone, at times nearly comic in its over-explanations and apologies, only to land on a final, devastating revelation about homelessness and human indifference. The poem operates on multiple levels—linguistically, it performs the instability of modern discourse, where every statement is preempted by disclaimers, qualifications, and an awareness of how it might be received. Thematically, it exposes the moral paralysis that arises from this linguistic hedging, pointing toward a deep societal failure to address suffering in any meaningful way.

From the very first phrase, “Excuse me but I’d like to say something,” the speaker signals hesitation, an unwillingness to commit fully to whatever is about to be expressed. This reluctance quickly morphs into an absurdly long-winded attempt to distance the statement from any broader interpretation—“should in no way be taken as representing other things I might say or words I could put down on paper but haven’t.” The syntax folds back on itself, full of redundancies and defensive preemptions, as though the speaker is aware of the tendency in modern discourse to take a single remark as a stand-in for a broader ideology. The exaggerated caution is both comic and painfully familiar, capturing the contemporary fear of being misinterpreted, of being inadvertently aligned with a political stance, of speaking in a way that is irrevocable.

Hicok’s use of an extended, breathless sentence with no punctuation to mark major transitions forces the reader to experience the poem in one continuous exhalation, much like an unfiltered rant or anxious monologue. As the poem progresses, the tone shifts subtly from defensive to satirical. The speaker describes various concerns—his dog, children, car, stale crackers in the pantry—all of which seem trivial, their inclusion emphasizing how people can easily become consumed by minor personal inconveniences while ignoring larger, urgent human crises. The mention of “the political affiliation of your god” introduces a surreal, tongue-in-cheek nod to the absurdity of ideological entrenchment, as though even divine beings are subject to partisan divisions. Meanwhile, the offhanded remark that “trees need their alone time too” provides a fleeting moment of absurd humor, a non sequitur that distracts from the darker undercurrent of the poem. The humor here is not simply levity; it serves as an evasion, a way for the speaker—and, by extension, society—to avoid confronting difficult truths directly.

This avoidance is shattered in the final lines, where the poem’s true subject emerges with devastating clarity. The speaker acknowledges, almost reluctantly, that “on a night such as this when the axis of the earth has tilted away from the sun and the great comfort of a quilt lies at your feet,” he “doesn’t mind if people sleep on the grates in the park over steam that’s going to heaven anyway because otherwise and I know it’s rude to mention this they’ll die.” The bathos of the phrase “and I know it’s rude to mention this” is particularly brutal, as it exposes the way discussions of homelessness are often treated as uncomfortable, inappropriate, or too politically charged to acknowledge. The heat rising from the grates—described as “steam that’s going to heaven anyway”—is an eerie, poetic image, suggesting both the inevitability of heat’s dissipation and, by extension, the futility of relying on such ephemeral sources of warmth for survival. The closing phrase, “because otherwise … they’ll die,” is delivered with such stark, unembellished directness that it renders the previous convolutions of language hollow by contrast.

Hicok masterfully uses the poem’s structure to enact its central critique. The bulk of the poem is taken up by anxious, self-reflexive disclaimers, a kind of verbal fog that obscures the speaker’s true concern. Only at the very end does the poem arrive at the blunt reality: people are dying on the streets, and the speaker—like much of society—has spent more time worrying about how to frame the issue than about the suffering itself. The contrast between the linguistic excess of the first part and the brutal simplicity of the last line is what makes the poem so effective. It forces the reader to recognize how language, especially in contemporary political and social discourse, can serve as a means of avoidance rather than engagement.

The poem’s title, “It’s Not So Much the Heat as the Stupidity”, suggests an inversion of expectation. Initially, one might assume the poem will be about discomfort in hot weather or some other banal frustration. Instead, it turns out to be about the stupidity—not of heat itself, but of human failure to act in the face of suffering. The phrase captures a sentiment of exasperation: it isn’t the external condition (heat or cold) that is most frustrating, but rather the senselessness of a world that allows avoidable tragedies to persist.

Hicok’s approach in this poem is both playful and deeply serious, employing humor and meandering digression to expose societal apathy. The long, tangled sentence mimics the way people talk around difficult subjects, while the final line delivers a blunt moral reckoning. The speaker’s self-conscious hesitations, his reluctance to appear aligned with any particular stance, reflect the broader cultural anxiety around political discourse—how statements are parsed, categorized, and used as weapons in ideological battles. Yet beneath this performative uncertainty is an undeniable truth: people are dying because of systemic neglect, and all the linguistic hedging in the world cannot change that reality.

Ultimately, “It’s Not So Much the Heat as the Stupidity” is a scathing indictment of rhetorical paralysis in the face of suffering. It forces the reader to confront the ways in which language can be both a tool for engagement and a means of obfuscation. The final moment of clarity—stark, undeniable, and horrifying—cuts through the noise, leaving us with the uncomfortable realization that the real obscenity is not speaking about suffering, but ignoring it.

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