A Grave--by Marianne Moore

A Grave

by Marianne Moore

Man looking into the sea,
taking the view from those who have as much right to it as
you have to it yourself,
it is human nature to stand in the middle of a thing,
but you cannot stand in the middle of this;
the sea has nothing to give but a well excavated grave.
The firs stand in a procession, each with an emerald turkey—
foot at the top,
reserved as their contours, saying nothing;
repression, however, is not the most obvious characteristic of
the sea;
the sea is a collector, quick to return a rapacious look.
There are others besides you who have worn that look—
whose expression is no longer a protest; the fish no longer
investigate them
for their bones have not lasted:
men lower nets, unconscious of the fact that they are
desecrating a grave,
and row quickly away-the blades of the oars
moving together like the feet of water-spiders as if there were
no such thing as death.
The wrinkles progress among themselves in a phalanx—
beautiful under networks of foam,
and fade breathlessly while the sea rustles in and out of the
seaweed;
the birds swim through the air at top speed, emitting cat-calls
as heretofore—
the tortoise-shell scourges about the feet of the cliffs, in motion
beneath them;
and the ocean, under the pulsation of lighthouses and noise of
bell-bouys,
advances as usual, looking as if it were not that ocean in which
dropped things are bound to sink—
in which if they turn and twist, it is neither with volition nor
consciousness.



This seems to be something of a reflection on the human consciousness and on human life and death. Everything is bright on the surface, where the everyday is, but underneath is deep and quiet and one's human ego no longer matters. the surface is transitory, like how

The wrinkles progress among themselves in a phalanx—
beautiful under networks of foam,
and fade breathlessly while the sea rustles in and out of the
seaweed;

as if nothing had ever happened.

The sea is a huge, immeasureable thing--

it is human nature to stand in the middle of a thing,
but you cannot stand in the middle of this;
the sea has nothing to give but a well excavated grave.

One cannot "stand in the middle" of it. I guess this could be pointing at how the human ego always places it in the middle of the universe as if one were The One who knew everything and were Everything. But we cannot stand in the middle of the sea.

Lastly, the poem coud also be on how humans are not too conscious of death in life. the sea is a "well-excavated grave", but

men lower nets, unconscious of the fact that they are
desecrating a grave,
and row quickly away-the blades of the oars
moving together like the feet of water-spiders as if there were
no such thing as death.

We do not know that those before us, who are now dead

have worn that [rapacious] look—
whose expression is no longer a protest; the fish no longer
investigate them
for their bones have not lasted

Instead, "the sea is a collector, quick to return a rapacious look" that we give it.

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Now for some professional help,

I haven't come close to understanding the poem myself.

On "A Grave"
Elizabeth H. Davis
In nearly all transformations of syllabics, deletion disturbs the stanzas into free verse. That process is physically evident in typescripts of "To a Snail" and "A Grave."
. . .
A pivotal typescript/manuscript of " A Grave" also shows the close relationship between excision and free verse (Rosenbach I:02:14). The key syllabic draft, itself a revision, begins the same way the final draft does—"Man looking into the sea." Four types of marks are handwritten on the typescript: deletions, alternative wordings in the margins, five slash marks in the first two stanzas, and an editorial comment—"All redundant." The next draft, on another page, excludes material deleted on the previous typescript, for example, "each with an emerald turkey foot at the top"; it replaces excised material with revisions pencilled in the margin of the previous typescript, for example, "their contemporaries row across them"; and it divides the poem as free verse, following the slash marks in the first two stanzas. The remarked-on redundancy triggers the change to free verse.

Although free verse line divisions are conveniently associated with deletions on this typescript, other factors may also have influenced the revision of "A Grave." The deletions are not as numerous as is typical with Moore's other free verse transformations, two deletions totalling 29 syllables out of a 333- syllable draft, and one of those deletions is replaced with alternative lines. Yet the one real deletion, "each with an emerald turkey foot at the top," is in the middle of the cluster of five slash marks which indicate all the divisions of lines 3 through 8 in the next draft, the first free verse version. It is ironic that this deleted material, apparently so crucial in the transformation of the poem, reappears in subsequent drafts, but by that time "A Grave" was settled in its free verse format.

Also, as Holley has suggested (83), line length may be especially important in "A Grave," which has three 32-syllable lines in the first syllabic draft. In the crucial second syllabic draft, Moore divides up the 32-syllable lines, creating another regular syllabic pattern with shorter lines. The slash marks on that draft may indicate other syllabic alternatives considered while Moore reworked the line lengths. Unsettled line length may be as significant as displacement by deletion in this poem. However, when Moore breaks up the 32-syllable lines, she produces another syllabic draft with an alternative regularity. The slash marks in that second draft, clustered around the only simple deletion marked on that crucial typescript, point to the deletion as the key element breaking up the form.

from "Marianne Moore's Concentrated Free Verse: 'Starve it Down and Make it Run.'" SAGETRIEB 10.3 ... ...more here: http://www.english.uiuc.edu/maps/poets/m_r/moore/grave.htm