15 pages • 30 minutes read
Jane KenyonOtherwise
Fiction | Poem | Adult | Published in 1996A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Symbols & Motifs
Uphill
The symbolic use of the world “uphill” (Line 10) is important to Kenyon’s poem. Although this notation literally refers to the uphill trek of the speaker as they walk their dog, it also can stand in for the battle to stay in the present moment, undistracted and fully appreciative of life. Whether the speaker is Kenyon battling her leukemia or an outside speaker struggling with maintaining happiness, the idea is that life itself is an uphill battle. The sweetness of life as it unfolds is often shadowed by the inevitable “otherwise.”
Work
In the poem Kenyon’s speaker notes that “All morning I did / the work I love” (Lines 11-12). From a biographical stance, this line refers to Kenyon’s work as an artist, a writer actively producing poems. In his interview with Cramer, Hall notes Kenyon often worked on poems in the morning. However, in a wider context, work may function as symbol for the speaker’s emotional process of working to appreciate the fullness of life rather than succumbing to the “otherwise” to which the speaker’s mind keeps returning.
Paintings on the Walls
At the end of “Otherwise,” the speaker mentions they “slept in a bed / in a room with paintings / on the walls” (Lines 20-22). The description of the room’s walls offers readers a way to read the poem itself. For example, the descriptions of the speaker’s daily routine are vivid and precise images, much like paintings, and the threatening refrain in the poem, that “one day [. . .] it will be otherwise” (Lines 25-26), frames the images. The words hang on the walls of the speaker’s mind, much like the paintings in the speaker’s bedroom.
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By Jane Kenyon
