Chapter 9: Poem Beginning with a Retweet – Summary & 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 a blunt accusation: failing to remark on horses when driving past makes a person a psychopath. It extends this idea to other everyday wonders—an airplane, a rainbow, a cardinal, a butterfly. The speaker then lists more specific moments of shared observation: whisper-shouting at an albino squirrel, a deer, a red fox; hushing everyone to hear a woodpecker; pointing out an unbroken sand dollar in a tide pool; seeing a dorsal fin break the water. The poem builds to the moon, where the speaker insists that not saying “oh my god look at the moon” is a failure. It then pivots: smelling smoke without searching for fire suggests complacency, but the final lines shift inward. The speaker describes a process of receding, receding, and not telling anyone until one is gone. The conditional “if” structure that governed the earlier stanzas now applies to a hidden personal withdrawal.
Key Events
- The poem begins with the assertion that not saying “horses” when driving past horses is psychopathic.
- It enumerates other unacknowledged sights: airplane, rainbow, cardinal, butterfly.
- It describes excited exclamations for an albino squirrel, deer, and red fox.
- It portrays shushing others to listen to a woodpecker.
- It notes the impulse to speak when finding an unbroken sand dollar.
- It mentions seeing a dorsal fin in water.
- It insists on saying “look at the moon” upon seeing it.
- It shifts to smelling smoke and not searching for fire.
- It concludes with feeling oneself receding and failing to tell anyone until it is too late.
Character Development
The speaker emerges as someone deeply attuned to the world’s small wonders and the social habit of sharing them. The opening accusation suggests a persona that values enthusiastic acknowledgment. Yet the final lines reveal a vulnerability: the same person who calls out others for not noticing may also be guilty of withdrawing inward. The poem’s movement from outward pointing to inward receding sketches a character caught between connection and isolation.
Themes, Symbols, or Motifs
- Observation and Shared Wonder: The poem celebrates the instinct to notice and verbalize the remarkable—horses, rainbows, woodpeckers. The “retweet” in the title frames this as a kind of digital or social sharing, making the act communal.
- Silence and Withdrawal: The final image of receding without warning contrasts sharply with the earlier noise. Silence here becomes a marker of emotional or existential distance.
- The Conditional as Threat: The repeated “if” constructs a world where failing to speak leads to being called a psychopath or, worse, disappearing. The conditionals blur the line between judgment and empathy.
- Natural and Domestic Imagery: The poem moves through landscapes (tide pools, fields, forests) and domestic gestures (shushing, pointing), grounding abstract themes in tangible moments.
Why This Chapter Matters
Placed late in Goldenrod, this poem crystallizes the collection’s ongoing tension between presence and absence. Earlier chapters often dwell on noticing—the weight of small beauties, the act of naming. Here, Smith raises the stakes: not pointing out something can be seen as a kind of pathology, yet the speaker ultimately admits to a quiet erasure. The chapter matters because it confronts the reader with the cost of silence, both in the shared world and within oneself. It also serves as a subtle bridge to later poems that explore loss and dislocation.
Study Questions and Answers
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How does the title’s retweet metaphor shape the poem’s meaning?
A retweet is a form of amplification and public acknowledgment. By beginning with a retweet, the speaker frames the act of pointing out wonders as a social duty—a way to validate and spread joy. When the poem ends without any retweet of the speaker’s own receding, the silence becomes a betrayal of that same impulse. -
What effect does the shift from external phenomena to internal state have on the poem?
The long list of outward wonders creates a rhythm of communal excitement. The turn to “smell smoke” introduces danger, and the final receding shifts the focus entirely inward. This move surprises the reader, revealing that the same person who demands noticing may be secretly disappearing. -
Why does the poet use the word “psychopath” in the first line?
The word is deliberately extreme, arresting the reader’s attention. It immediately establishes the poem’s high stakes: failing to participate in shared observation is not just rude but pathological. This hyperbolic opening makes the later quiet withdrawal all the more unsettling.