Imitating Jack Gilbert's "Going There" by John Vigliotti

Going There by Jack Gilbert (from The Great Fires)


Of course it was a disaster.
The unbearable, dearest secret
has always been a disaster.
The danger when we try to leave.
Going over and over afterward
what we should have done
instead of what we did.
But for those short times
we seemed to be alive. Misled,
misused, lied to and cheated,
certainly. Still, for that
little while, we visited
our possible life.

Waking Up to Jimi Hendrix in a Tent

In the depths of the mind
lay darkness, illuminated shadow
of what memories we know.
behind the shadow is questions and reality
In reverie we doubt ourselves
What could have been if
things had gone another way
Yet at the current moment
living fast is good living. Blurred,
lost, drunk as a skunk,
found. However, we still
just go, back to
this medicated youth

Going about Imitation:
This was a difficult process because Jack Gilbert has a ton of interesting poems in his book
This poem caught my attention because he writes about the abstract topic of internalized memories.
He always alludes to regret like "what we should have done. instead of what we did." I chose this poem
because of its subject matter and because it interested me; although I knew my imitation could not
do his justice I thought I'd take a stab at it.

As far as patterns go the first thing I noticed was his repeated use of words beginning with D in the beginning of the poem.
Like in the first three lines: "Of course it was a disaster. The unbearable, dearest secret
has always been a disaster. The danger." This repetition really made these strong words even more powerful. He skips one line then does another two lines of repetition with the letter "D".
This repetition didn't do as much for the poem as the first instance but it's still notable. The last pattern I found was his use of "mislead" and "misused" which makes you slow down when you read it
so it keeps the reader's attention on what is written. This is definitely important and Jack Gilbert does it well. I think the volta is on line #8 where he writes "But for those short times."
It changes the tone from the repetition of negativity to a slight optimism about "their" lives. It adds a nice contrast to the rest of the poem and provides a lapse, which leads to the continued internalized speculation of the mind.

With my poem I tried to do one thing in the beginning then changed it up in the second half. Its a shame I could not have done it as well as Jack Gilbert but that's what this course is for I guess. I wanted to use simple language because Gilbert doesn't overwhelm his with anything complex yet it's still powerful.
I wanted to portray our generations ties to past generations in that we all enjoy being intoxicated but still put a negative connotation on such activities that all are guilty of. It's a bit too much to do with such a short poem and my ability but again, I took a stab at it. The title comes from my father's story
of being at Woodstock 69' and waking up to Jimi playing; I always associate it with the medicated youth. I'm going to revise this poem and work with that image much more..