“The Asians Dying” by W. S. Merwin [pg. 259]

This poem gives a hollow feeling when I first read it. The first image, a destroyed forest, is what I found appealing. It gives the feeling of lasting existence. For example, if UCI were to be bulldozed people would still remember where certain buildings used to be. The speaker mentions that “the forests have been destroyed their darkness remains” as if the memory of the place still remains. The middle of the first verse gives a feeling that the scene is unworldly. The first verse ends with an image of ghosts leaving towards the sky. It comes back to the hollow feeling since the souls are leaving the area. The mention of losing a soul creates emptiness. In the second verse, rain is falling on the open eyes of the dead. I take this to mean that the dead are buried with their faces towards the sky. But, the image of having the eyes open creates a feeling of uneasiness since closing the eyes are a symbol of dying peacefully. It leads me to believe that something violent happened. The last verses gave me the idea that hollowness and temporariness are somewhat related. The beginning of the third verse states that “nights disappear like bruises but nothing is healed, The dead go away like bruises”. The dead, who were once alive, made their mark on the land. Now that the people are dead, they will be forgotten over time. I think the entire poem is about how people make their mark on history, no matter how small the mark is. It contains harsh words, such as “dying”, “dead”, and “blood” yet the overall mood of the poem is not harsh at all. I think it has a somber tone due to the soft sounding words.