Digging

I really liked “Digging” from this week’s reading because this type of poem—straightforward yet complex—is a type I really love to read, and ironically a type that I also can’t write that well. I like it because it is easy on the eyes, very simple, and yet it can have just as much meaning as poems that choose to word their respective thoughts in ways that make you rub your temples and question why you’re majoring in English. Not that I don’t like those poems, at times, it’s just nice to see something powerful said without all the flair.

I also like this poem because it reminds me of my own relationship with my father. It’s hardly an original story, but growing up my Dad always wanted me to follow in his footsteps in a lot of things, and though in some ways I have, in others I have branched out on my own, just like Heaney chooses to wield his pen instead of a spade.

Along with the surface simplicity, I really loved the imagery created by this poem; I really had a vision of his grandfather and father gardening. I love a poem with striking imagery, because it makes the meaning more impressionable.