The Unordinary World: Poem Summary and Analysis
⚠️ Spoiler Warning: This guide contains detailed spoilers for the entire novel. Proceed only if you've finished reading or are comfortable knowing the plot.
Summary
The poem opens with the declaration, "The worst is over," but qualifies it with "Depending on who you ask." This immediately sets a tone of tentative relief. The speaker then describes a newfound solitude—not an imposed quarantine but a chosen stillness. The collective "we" yearns for a moment of personal peace, akin to a moon fondly orbiting its planet. The poem shifts to a forward-looking stance: "Now that the best has begun, / Depending on who you ask," rejecting the image of a worm shrinking from light. Instead, it envisions a sun-drenched sea and portrays souls as both solar and soldiering—radiant and resilient. The speaker asserts that a "cut of that burning" exists in everyone, suggesting an intrinsic light or strength. The final line, "Who are we, if not / What we make of the dark," reframes identity as an active creation born from hardship. The poem moves from acknowledging a crisis's end to claiming agency in shaping meaning from darkness.
Key Events
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Acknowledgment of Survival: The poem begins by noting that the worst phase has passed, but immediately introduces ambiguity with the phrase "Depending on who you ask." This acknowledges uneven experiences and lingering trauma.
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Redefinition of Solitude: The speaker describes being alone "Not by command, / But because all we’ve ever desired / Is a second of our own." This reframes isolation as a deliberate choice for stillness and observation, not a punishment.
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Lunar Metaphor: The image of being "Remote but non-distant, / Like a moon orbiting / The globe it’s most fond of" highlights a connected yet discrete existence—close enough to care, far enough to maintain individual peace.
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Turning Toward Hope: The poem pivots with "Now that the best has begun," again qualified by perspective. The language shifts from relief to proactive defiance.
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Rejection of Fearful Retreat: The line "We will be no worm, / Shrinking from all that shines" rejects a timid response to brightness, suggesting an embrace of what is luminous and good.
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Vision of a Bright Future: "Our future is a sea / Flooded with sun" paints an overwhelmingly positive landscape. The alliteration and imagery evoke abundance and clarity.
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Merging of Light and Strength: The phrase "Our souls, so solar & soldiering" combines solar energy with martial resilience, implying that inner radiance is also a form of courageous endurance.
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Shared Inner Fire: The declaration "There is a cut of that burning in us all" suggests that every person carries a fragment of this determined light—a scar or gift of inner strength.
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Defiant Identity Question: The poem concludes with a rhetorical question: "Who are we, if not / What we make of the dark." This positions identity as a creative response to darkness, not a victimhood of it.
Character Development
The speaker in this poem is a collective "we," representing humanity or a community emerging from crisis. The character arc is subtle but distinct. Initially, the "we" is reflective, tentatively acknowledging that the worst may be over while still holding ambiguity. The desire for a "second of our own" reveals a newfound appreciation for stillness and self-possession. As the poem progresses, the collective voice grows more assertive and visionary, rejecting passivity ("no worm") and claiming a future "flooded with sun." The shift from "still & seeing" to "solar & soldiering" marks a transformation from contemplation to active, radiant resilience. The final question solidifies this development: identity is forged not by the dark itself but by what is made from it, indicating agency and creativity. The "we" evolves from survivors seeking quiet to architects of light and meaning.
Themes, Symbols, and Motifs
Choice vs. Imposed Isolation: The poem opens by contrasting the earlier commanded loneliness with a chosen solitude. This theme reclaims autonomy over one’s state of being. The line "Not by command" explicitly severs the link between aloneness and coercion, framing it as a desired condition for introspection.
Light and Dark Imagery: The poem is drenched in light symbolism: "shines," "sun," "solar," "burning." Darkness appears explicitly only at the end as "the dark." Light represents hope, inner strength, and a bright future, while darkness symbolizes hardship, crisis, or the unknown. The interplay suggests that light is not merely given but drawn from within and transformed from darkness.
The Moon and Orbit: The moon orbiting a beloved globe symbolizes a relationship of connected distance. It evokes care without enmeshment, a state of fond observation. This motif captures the paradox of quarantine-era connection—physically remote yet emotionally invested.
The Worm: The worm that shrinks from light is a symbol of fear, avoidance, or a belittled self. Rejecting this image, the speaker refuses to be diminished by challenges or to hide from brightness.
Solar and Soldiering Souls: The fusion of "solar" (sun-like) with "soldiering" (military endurance) creates a motif of enlightened resilience. It suggests that true strength is not just toughness but a radiant, proactive force that battles darkness not with aggression but with light.
Making from the Dark: The final motif transforms darkness from a negative state into raw material. Identity is sculpted from adversity, echoing the broader collection’s theme of finding language and selfhood in the aftershocks of collective trauma.
Why This Chapter Matters
"The Unordinary World" occupies a crucial pivot point in Call Us What We Carry. As the collection moves past the most acute phases of the COVID-19 pandemic and social reckoning, this poem distills the shift from endurance to emergence. It does not offer naive optimism; the repeated "Depending on who you ask" acknowledges unequal experiences of recovery. Yet it insists on agency: we are not defined by what happened to us but by what we build from it. The poem’s title itself subverts the trope of a return to an "ordinary world" after a hero’s journey, suggesting instead a new, unordinary existence shaped by vision and will. Its language of light and soldiering encapsulates Gorman’s broader project of healing through poetry, making it a touchstone for understanding the collection’s arc from crisis to creative renewal. It also models a subtle craft: the poem’s brevity and musicality carry immense thematic weight, showing students how precise metaphor and rhetorical questioning can convey complex emotional states.
Study Questions and Answers
1. What does the qualification "Depending on who you ask" reveal about the speaker’s view of recovery?
The repeated phrase acknowledges that the end of hardship is not universally felt. It introduces a note of humility and realism, recognizing that marginalized or hard-hit communities may still be suffering. This prevents the poem from becoming a blanket statement of triumph and instead grounds it in empathy and awareness of disparity.
2. How does the poem transform the idea of solitude from a negative to a positive state?
Initially, solitude was likely mandated during quarantine. The poem reclaims it as a desire: "all we’ve ever desired / Is a second of our own." The imagery of the moon—remote yet fond—shows solitude as a chosen space for stillness and meaningful observation, not disconnection. The shift is from loneliness to purposeful aloneness.
3. Analyze the final question: "Who are we, if not / What we make of the dark." What is Gorman suggesting about identity and adversity?
Gorman suggests that identity is not innate but constructed through our response to darkness. Instead of being defined by suffering, we become the creators of meaning and beauty born from it. This reframes adversity as raw material for self-definition, emphasizing agency, resilience, and the transformative power of creativity.