| Preface to "The Examination" |
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I've pretty much always been a Libertarian. In high school I got in trouble for merely referring
to birth-control devices in an essay on the topic of Over-Population in the school newspaper.
And another of my student essays there titled "The Case Against Conformism" - was written at a time of life when most kids are jumping off cliffs to be like the other guys. So you can imagine my reaction when I ran into the poem "The Examination" in college. It has remained my all-time favorite poem both for content and style. The poem is supposedly about the examination procedure for a college degree. But it so well depicts the totalitarian types who would crush the individual down to the lowest common denominator - that I cannot help but love it. |
| BUNI |
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T H E E X A M I N A T I O N by W. D. Snodgrass |
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Under the thick beams of that swirly smoking light, The black robes are clustering, huddled in together. Hunching their shoulders, they spread short, broad sleeves like night- Black grackle's wings and reach out bone-yellow leathery fingers, each to each. They are prepared. Each turns His single eye - or since one can't discern their eyes, That reflective, single, moon pale disc which burns Over each brow - to watch this uncouth shape that lies Strapped to their table. One probes with his ragged nails The slate-sharp calf, explores the thigh and the lean thews Of the groin. Others raze, red as piratic sails, His wing, stretching, trying the pectoral sinews. One runs his finger down the wheat of that cruel Golden beak, lifts back the horny lids from the eyes, Peers down in one bright eye, malignant as a jewel, And steps back suddenly, 'He is anesthetized?' 'He is. He is. Yes. Yes!' The tallest of them, bent Down by the head, rises, 'This drug possesses powers Sufficient to still all gods in this firmament. This is Garuda who was fierce. He's yours for hours. 'We shall continue, please.' Now, once again, he bends to the skull, and its clamped tissues. Into the cran- ial cavity, he plunges both of his hands like obstetric forceps and lifts out the great BRAIN, Holds it aloft, then gives it to the next who stands Beside him. Each, in turn, accepts it, although loath, Turns it this way, that way, feels it between his hands Like a wasps' nest or some sickening outsized growth. They must decide what thoughts each part of it must think; They tap at, then listen beside, each suspect lobe, Then, with a crow's quill dipped into India ink, Mark on its surface, as if on a map or globe, The dangerous areas which need to be excised. They rinse it, then apply antiseptic to it. And silver saws appear which, inch by inch, slice Through its ancient folds and ridges, like thick suet. It's rinsed, dried, and daubed with thick salves. The smoky saws Are scrubbed, resterilized, and polished till they gleam. The brain is repacked in its case. Pinched in their claws, Glimmering needles stitch it up, that leave no seam. Meantime, one of them has set blinders to the eyes, Inserted light packing beneath each of the ears And caulked the nostrils in. One, with thin twine, ties The genitals off. With long wooden-handled shears, Another chops pinions out of the scarlet wings. It's hoped that with disuse he will forget the sky Or, at least, in time, learn, among other things, To fly no higher than his superiors fly. Well; that's a beginning. The next time, they can split His tongue and teach him to talk correctly, can give him memory of fine books and choose clothing fit For the integrated area where he'll live. Their candidate may live to give them thanks one day. He will recover and may hope for such success He shall return to join their ranks. Bowing away, They nod, whispering, 'One of ours; one of ours. Yes. Yessssssssss.' Phi Beta Kappa poem, Columbia University, 1961 |
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