17 pages • 34 minutes read
W. D. SnodgrassMementos, 1
Fiction | Poem | Adult | Published in 1987A 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
The Photograph
The photograph of the speaker’s former wife is the poem’s central symbol. The rediscovery of the photo provides a kind of framing device for flashbacks that dominate most of the poem and ties together all of its thematic preoccupations. The speaker describes how he found the photo among commonplace items, such as “canceled checks, old clippings” (Line 2) as well as other mementos like “yellow note cards / That meant something once” (Lines 2-3). The speaker’s use of the phrase “[t]hat meant something once” in relation to the note cards suggests that not all mementos retain their emotional power with the passage of time. The photograph, however, has indeed maintained its power: “I happened to find / Your Picture. That picture. I stopped there cold” (Lines 3-4). The specificity of the speaker’s phrasing, “That picture” emphasizes that it is no ordinary photo, and the memories and feelings it represents have played an important role in the speaker’s life. As the speaker continues to elaborate on the photo’s significance in the ensuing stanzas—the fact it is of his former wife, the way it functioned as a memento in a very different way during the war as opposed to now, its status as a reminder of lost youth and love—it becomes more and more clear why “That picture” is something he continues to keep.
War
War and conflict are important motifs in the second half of the poem. In the poem’s third stanza, the speaker remembers a literal armed conflict in which he served (World War II), recalling “the war and those two long years / Overseas” (Lines 13-14). He also remembers the enemy he fought against and describes “the Japanese dead in their shacks / Among dishes, dolls, and lost shoes” (Lines 14-15). The imagery in these lines contrasts the horrors of war in the reference to “the Japanese dead” lying around “in their shacks” with items that represent the domestic, ordinary, and mundane: “Among dishes, dolls, and lost shoes.” This juxtaposition suggests there is a wide and disconcerting gulf between the experience of war and the experience of day-to-day life, with the disruption of the domestic representing a violation of the usual sanctity of the home. Yet, in the poem’s fourth and final stanza, the speaker describes a different kind of conflict—the domestic conflict between himself and his former wife that eventually ended their marriage. He describes the conflict as “drain[ing] out one another's life force / With lies, self-denial, unspoken regret / And the sick eyes that blame” (Lines 19-21), recounting how the end result was “the divorce / And the treachery” (Lines 21-22). In these lines, the speaker subtly suggests that sometimes the violation of the home space is not always due to an external conflict (such as a war) but is instead often kindled from within, with betrayal and treachery between spouses or lovers functioning as a different type of warfare.
Time
Time in all its manifestations—past, present, and future—dominates the poem as a motif from beginning to end. The past appears in the form of the photograph, found among the other mementos the speaker has collected over the years of his life. Reminiscing about what the photo represents enables the speaker to rediscover the contrasting stages of his life as a young man and now as an older divorced man, leading him to reflect upon how “our needs were different then / And our ideals came easy” (Lines 11-12) in comparison to the present. The photo leads him through multiple stages of his past: his youth, when he first met his wife at “our first dance” (Line 10); his service in “the war and those two long years / Overseas” (Lines 13-14) when he clung to the photo as a reminder of home and as a symbol of what could happen after the war; and finally the years of decline in the relationship, which eventually led to “the divorce” (Line 21) that put an end to the marriage. The future then appears in the poem’s closing lines, when the speaker decides to keep the photo and anticipates how “Someday, in due course / I will find that it’s still there” (Lines 23-24).
