‘I Remember Learning How to Dive’ Ada Wofford
Alien Buddha Press
ISBN 9798681715955
‘I Remember Learning How to Dive’ is a series of narrative poems laid out as diary entries. The entries are not chronological, rather, they flick back and forth as if someone is flipping through a journal trying to piece together a half-remembered event and hoping the journal entries will fill out what’s forgotten. Each is titled with a date and time. Early entries start with an image of a lake, ‘September 14, 2007 6:45am’ where there are waves
‘that are not waves
not truly
they are ripples
set in motion far away
the geese enjoy them’
The poem suggests that the observed event will have ripples, i.e. consequences, felt long after the event is over. These consequences are gentle, they don’t toss or upend the recipient and, as they get further away from the centre, their impact diminishes. Outsiders, such as the geese, might enjoy the show but they have no emotional investment in the central drama. The narrator seems reluctant to move on, ‘September 14, 2007 7:04am’ a wind
‘tufts her hair
Red ruby hair
Dyed the color it was when
she was young
When she was eager and strong
When she stood at the lake
Out on the dock
Where the high board used to stand
Where the divers would climb
the ladder and dive
Before people left and the geese
felt good making home
Before it went from a lake you swim in
to a lake you stare at
Before now’
The passing of time is revealed in the dyed hair. Red is a colour of passion, of rebellion, of warning. Does she continue to dye it because she wants to maintain the persona she had when younger, not yet ready to relinquish youth or because it’s a reminder of happier times? ‘Before it went from a lake you swim in/ to a lake you stare at’ implies whatever happened cannot be reversed and was life-changing. The diver no longer feels the urge to dive. Others seem to feel the same way, leaving the lake so the geese have moved in. The narrator is revealed to be Flora, visiting her sister Judy, in ‘September 14, 2007, 2:36pm’
‘There’s bags under her eyes
cloudgray eyes
jowls forming in her cheeks
Her slouching posture
It’s the first time I’ve had a good
look at her in years
wonder how long my sister has
looked so old’
It’s not just age that has caused Judy’s older appearance. Sleepless nights have added their toll. ‘Her slouching posture’ implies someone who’s had bigger concerns than appearance and creates a sense of defeat. A series of poems return to August so readers learn in ‘August 15, 2007 3:15pm’ John had a stroke. In ‘August 15, 2007 7:38pm’ ‘She left the hospital without/saying goodbye to her husband’ A darker picture emerges. There is tension between the sisters. Flora accuses her sister of forgetting in ‘September 8, 2007 2:24pm’
Being sent to rehab twice.
Cracking your head open in front
of your son
too drunk to walk.
How can you forget?
Throwing yourself into the ocean
that night.
Remember the fighting?’
Flora goes on to ask ‘How can you use all this pain as an/excuse?’ as if Judy has been playing the martyr, blinkered to the problems others have had to face and overcome, unable to acknowledge the pain she herself has caused. Judy doesn’t have an answer. Flora jumps forward to ‘September 9 2007 12:08am’ and memory, ‘I remember learning how to dive’,
‘I would close my eyes and I would jump.
Fall through the nothing
and cut through the water
razor clean,
barely making a
splash.
And then I’d open my eyes and all that
nothingness would disappear’
Judy’s melodramas have taken attention away from her sister. Flora has grown in her sister’s shadow, learning to put her own needs aside. More memories surface in ‘September 14, 2007 3:14am’, ‘Using your son’s suicide as an excuse/for everything’ […] ‘You tried to slit your wrists for us./This is what you want, right?/You asked like a confused child’ The threat of suicide without intent to see it through is manipulative. Its purpose is to draw attention and sympathy where perhaps it is not deserved. Her histrionics become a refrain, in ‘August 20, 2007 2:19am. September 4, 2007 11:15am. September 7, 2007 6:32am. September 12, 2007 4:27pm. September 14, 2007 5:18am.’
‘Why should I spend my life
Caring for a man
I no longer love’
The multiple diary entries suggest this is a frequently returned to refrain. Caring is hard work and leaves little time for the carer, but here Judy appears selfish and unprepared to care for a man she was in love with. Had roles been reversed, a man placed in a position where he had to care for his lover, Judy’s outburst might seem more acceptable. But Judy is a woman, a person society expects to care and love and be selfless even though she doesn’t seem capable of this.
Flora muses in the small hours, in ‘September 14, 2007 5:52am’
‘It’s like those planes
you read about,
those ones that just
disappear.
And you think
what happened
to those planes
you know
they don’t just
disappear.’
Flora seems to be doubting her memories. Perhaps Judy has exaggerated and lied to get what she wants so often, Flora isn’t sure what she’s remembered and what Judy has given her as memories. Or perhaps the problem is that Judy’s melodramas put her at the centre so that others bury their wants and needs to cater to Judy. But instead of fading away, the wants and needs remain, ready to resurface.
‘I Remember Learning How to Dive’ is an exploration of memory, of caring and family duties and responsibilities, particularly for those cast in the role of carer. Judy is a martyred carer, resentful and self-centred. Flora, picking up the pieces, has edged around Judy’s lake, however, in avoiding disturbing the lake’s surface, Flora neglects her own needs. Her needs sink, waiting for Flora to dive in and retrieve them. The non-chronological order mimics the way memory works: things rise to the surface and trigger connections to other memories, gradually creating a narrative. The reader becomes detective: picking up clues. While the narrative is not complex it is intriguing and thought-provoking, holding up a mirror to how families relate and (dis)connect.
Emma Lee