Sign Inventory, Week Ten

"The Promise," by Marie Howe

   In the dream I had when he came back not sick
   but whole, and wearing his winter coat,

   he looked at me as though he couldn't speak, as if
   there were a law against it, a membrane he
      couldn't break

   His silence was what he could not
   not do, like our breathing in this world,
     like our living.

   As we do, in time.
   And I told him: I'm reading all this
     Buddhist stuff,

   and listen, we don't die when we die. Death is
     an event,
   a threshold we pass through. We go on and on

   and into light forever.
   And he looked down, and then back up at me.
     It was the look we'd pass

   across the table when Dad was drunk again
     and dangerous,
   the level look that wants to tell you something,

   in a crowded room, something important,
     and can't



Sign Inventory: 

1) One of the more interesting things I found while looking at this poem is the fact that the narrator desperately tries and seeks for various ways/outlets through which she can justify illness and death... but not so much as to help/comfort the one that is sick, but actual provide some type of self-comfort for the narrator.     

2) Also, I wonder what the poet might be getting at with the ending... why end it this way? Does the seemingly open-ended closure of the piece leave room for hope? Or does it mostly insinuate that there, in fact, is no hope because there wasn't any to start with... kind of a lost-cause type of thing? 

3) Looking at the opening of the poem, the narrator begins with "In the dream I had..." so, looking back at the piece as a whole, does this signify that the entire event occurring throughout the piece is a dream? If so, I wonder what the implications of the dream might be? I ask this question because if the whole poem is truly a dream, then it's one heck of a fabrication... 

4) I wonder too why the speaker's brother cannot speak... why it is something he "could not not do?" Is it something that has been caused by his illness? Or is it the way things have always been... or maybe just the overbearing weight of it all. I mean, I assume finding out that you are dying doesn't typically evoke conversation. 

5) Looking again more directly and closely at the narrator's reference/mention of religion, more specifically Buddhism., I cannot help but to question if this relationship has or ever was founded on some type of religious belief... if so, what might this say about the narrator? For one, it might be a comment on looking for reassuring answers and comforting words. Or, in another light, it might suggest a lack of something, and the speaker is frantically trying to fill the void. Or... maybe... the speaker has been searching for a religion that will be most helpful and secure in thoughts about life after death... I'm not sure.

6) What's with the mentioning of their dad... and how might it be important or bring something new to the table about the piece? Could this be suggesting a reason for the brother's silence? Could this be a nostalgic moment wherein the speaker recalls a  traumatic event from childhood that possible caused the children to make a promise between one another? I'm not sure exactly about this either.. 

7) Lastly, I wonder what the heck is up with the title of the poem? It seems a very odd fit considering the nature and context of the piece...