EXPLANATION TO A STUDENT
Even in Shakespeare, some words mean
what they seem; here water is its ordinary self, dripping
no irony, sloshing waves up the shore,
and when Roderigo wants to drown himself
from sorrow, he means, quite literally drown.
If you do not see a circle floating above the line,
a buoy marking deeper meanings,
notes submerged by ripples of thous and 'zounds,
you may lie on the raft of the surface--
as Roderigo might have, unrequited but still too light
for drowning, or as you would be carried
from your chair if a friend said, I'd love
some water. You'd fill her glass with liquid,
tasteless and transparent, not wondering
if she wanted something metaphoric (the boiling point,
viscosity, and surface tension unusually high
for its molecular weight), like tragedy, or love.
When the time comes to navigate
the shoals inside soliloquies, you'll have to trust
not all words will deceive you. Not all are false
as water, which you'll remember
Othello calls the dead Desdemona, to explain
why he has killed her, why he would not listen
to her vow she had always been true.
--Alexandra Teague,
from her recent award-winning volume
Mortal Geography.
