The Human Binary

The Human Binary

            The poems Conversation With A Stone and The Onion by Wislawa Szymborska, to me appear to be distantly related to one another.  There are several ways in which the two poems may be connected; though this may require one to make ambiguous inferences as they do not share a similar structure, rhyme scheme or other properties commonly shared between other poems that work together.  To claim that there is a working relationship between these two poems or that they “work together” one must consider that the most important aspects to consider are the speakers and characters as well as the subject matter and attitudes articulated in their lines. 

            The first poem, Conversation With A Stone, one of the most notable properties is the form.   There is no rigid structure to the poem; rather there is a simple give and take or conversational relationship between a man and a stone.  As a dialogue poem the stanzas do not exhibit much form in their individual construction with regards to rhyme, meter or other aesthetic qualities utilized commonly in poetic forms; rather the form is derived from the dialogue between a man and a stone.  The structure is unique to the poem and the author devotes two stanzas to each of the exchanges between the two characters which are initiated by the man in one stanza and responded to by the stone in a second follow-up stanza to complete the exchange.  This is essentially true throughout the poem, though Szymborska

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deviates from this form in the seventh through the ninth stanzas.  This could have serious implications affecting the poems meaning that

            In the beginning of the poem the man says, “I knock at the stone’s front door./ ‘It’s only me, let me come in,’” (Stone, 1-2).  This is basis by which communication is initiated by the man in each instance, which is about every two stanzas.  Szymborska dedicates one stanza to the man’s request and explanation of his request and one stanza to the stone’s response and explanation of his response to the man’s request.  Much like the man’s request, the stones response is a predictable incident as they both exhibit a form of repetition throughout the poem.

The conversational volley is littered with irony.  The man, who I assume is representative of “man” in the greater context of the human race, seems to be this inquisitive and explorative being with a thirst for answers to questions about the world in which he lives.  The stone, whom the man is fascinated with, is personified through rhetoric and displaying its ability for abstract thought.  Ironically the characteristics that the stone embodies seem to be more human like than stone like.  It also is important to note that the man seems to only see the stone through a very narrow lens.  He has made up his mind that there is way to explore the stone and its wonders.  This is evident through his approach to each stanza that I have cited in lines one and two as the man repeats those very words throughout the duration of the poem.  The man does not appear to have the potential to widen this lens because he is persistent in his pursuit of an answer to a question through one unchanging approach.  In

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addition the stone repeatedly says he cannot possibly comply with the man’s demand to let him enter.  The stone says,

                        “’I’m shut tight./

                        Even if you break me to pieces,/

                        we’ll all still be closed./

                        You can grind us to sand,

                        we still won’t let you in.”

(Stone, 7-11)

I take this as literal evidence that the inherent differences between man and stones cannot allow for man to physically render himself into the world of the stone to understand it.  This is interesting because man has learned to use stone as a building material and has built houses, castles and a vast array of other things from stone in which the man may enter, but the idea here is that the man could never really explore the inside of a stone which is indeed an ambiguous idea altogether.  No matter how many pieces the stone were broken into the man still could not enter into it. 

The dialogue appears to be a metaphor for how man interacts with his environment.  The man keeps viewing the stone as something that may be opened and explored like a building when he mentions the stone’s “halls”, when in fact the reader may observe that this is not the case and the man cannot transcend the physical barriers that set him apart from the stone which is an inanimate object.  One view to consider is that the author may be trying to tell her readers that humans and other objects in nature are contrasting to each other in the

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known view of the world.  Further, a binary that may be observed with regards to this idea and that stones, leaves and raindrops do not share enough of the same qualities with man for a mutual understanding to be reached between them; however if one is to consider this perspective on the poem one must also assume that in the binary that one side is favored.  It is interesting to see that it is not necessarily man with the more desirable qualities, rather the stone seems to possess those which society values with regards to intelligence.  The difference between the two still remains, the living an inanimate.  There are inherent qualities in man that prevent him from fully understanding the stone as he is mortal.  A great example of this is in the sixth stanza when the stone says,

                        “’Beautiful, perhaps, but not to the taste/

                        of your poor senses./

You may get to know me, but you’ll never know me through./

                        My whole surface is turned towards you,/

                        All my insides, turned away,’”

                        (Stone, 32-36)

By the fact that the man and the stone are made up of different parts and the sum of those parts creates two different things, it is certain that they be eternally different.  This also presents a new and interesting perspective lens by which to view the poem.  May be the stone really is not a stone at all. 

            The second poem, The Onion exhibits several formal differences with regards to stanza formation and subject matter from the first poem.  In this poem the subject is an onion, and is

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described as such; however there seems to be some sort of deeper meaning that is tough to extrapolate from its lines.  The metaphor of the onion appears to me to be expandable to describe many different things to be what they are.  An interesting prospect for the audience to consider is that it may describe man and man’s nature.  An excerpt that one could use to apply this thought is found in the second stanza.

                        “Our skin is just a coverup/

                        For the land where none dare go,/

                        An internal inferno,/

                        The anathema of anatomy.”

                        (Onion, 9-12)

This metaphor could describe the internal workings of man, as well as the protective barrier of personality that man utilizes to protect his most sacred thoughts and feelings from the view and encroachment of others on them.

            The latter theory about the stone not being a stone at all may be the saving grace that allows for these two poems to work together.  If the man were a man, representing all men rather than the human race, then the stone could represent a woman representing all women.  This is an intriguing thought when one considers the theory of The Onion describing a person’s internal workings and the physical and metaphysical barriers that one builds to protect his/her feelings or thoughts from the infringement of others.  Men and women commonly display differences between the two sexes and that feeds into the inherently different qualities that were exemplified via the man and the stone metaphor.  In lines thirty two through thirty six

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(cited on page 4) the stone says that it may be beautiful but that the man’s senses were not attuned to that sort of beauty.  It is the internal beauty that the man cannot possibly see because he is inherently different than the stone, or woman in this case.  He cannot understand that beauty because her entire surface is turned towards the man and her internal qualities are hidden from his sight. (Stone, 35-36)  When these line in A Conversation With A Stone are compared with the lines 9-12 of The Onion one may see that there is a corollary relationship between the two poems; the onion talked about in the poem is about as much made up of onion as the stone were consisted of rock.  Another thing to consider is the twelfth line of The Onion and the use of the word “anathema”.   It is not as positive in describing the insides of the onion as the word beauty was used to describe the inside of the stone; however the fact remains the same that they both describe the inner workings of an individual. 

            The poems work together in regards to content and metaphor when one considers the male/female lens for A Conversation With A Stone, and when compared to The Onion the one considers the internal/external qualitative approach.  When considered in these fashions the lenses overlap a bit allowing for the audience to see a relationship between the two which permits one poem to give meaning to the other and vice versa.  This is a working relationship, though the poems are structured very differently.  They both exhibit human qualities of which the greatest binary between the two is born, the internal versus the external qualities of each; the man, the stone, and the onion.  It is by these overlapping qualities which are identified

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through the recognition of the aforementioned binary that one may see the amalgamation of the human qualities that allow these poems to complement each other’s existence.