Big I, Eye, Aye.

             Poets and novelists have penned it, singer-songwriters have crooned it, and everyday persons have felt for a whisper of it. It has enraptured and confounded masses through the ages, and still to this day, when something is ‘instyle’ in the morning, and ‘out’ by night, it has it’s fans. It has built and brought down kingdoms. What is it? Love. A poem by the name of In the Metro shows one man’s -Mikhail Kvilividze – comments on the subject. He, through the poem, comments that love is a commitment that one should stick to, but that it also may be bonding, and aging.

              At the beginning of the poem, the speaker passes by a girl in the metro. For the remainder of the poem, he is pondering the emotions this passing by sparked, and the implications of them and a committed relationship, with children. Although the speaker (readers are unaware whether this speaker is Kvivilidze himself or not) realizes he is commited and decides not to trail, he is ‘lusting’ after this girl in the metro. Although he is partially attracted to her physically, noticing her shining legs, he is more attracted to the idea she embodies. She is young, and free to move. In this way, the voice is experiencing longing, or lust for what she represents because his commitment can not give him both stability and free range.

           One thing that she represents is unrestrained motion. During the poem, this girl he has crossed paths with is constantly in motion. She has “shining legs in the metro”. Shining legs (not matte or rough) conjure up the image of fluidity and aerodynamics. The locations she is depicted in also show her motion – on a metro (a high speed vehicle), on an escalator, on a river flowing towards the sea. Not only is she free, but she is also young and delicate also. In the poem, this can be exemplified by the speaker always referring to her as ‘girl’, not woman, and also his choice of imagery of a flower. A flower is soft, delicate, pretty, and light enough to float on the water. The girl on the metro is what the speaker longs to be, or possess.

           What the speaker most desperately wants to possess freedom. This is because his current relationship has him feeling bound. This is Kvilividze generalizing about love and relationships as a ‘jail cell’-like commitment. Others may feel freed by love returned, but instead he feels tied down to what being a family entails. Kvilividze is commenting in a pessimistic (although possibly very honest) tone that love isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. Because love takes long hours, and well, it’s work. It is not all passion and romantics – that dies out. And what is left, the poet says, is a ball and chain.

              This point of view is exemplified by  his choice of words. The speaker is ‘crucified to family duties’. Crucifiction is either being killed by having one’s hands and feet nailed to a wooden cross, to be tormented or persecuted, or to be subdued. Therefore, if the speaker is feeling crucified, he feels as if he is either being cruelly toyed with or pushed down. He is bound (quite literally). Furthermore, in contrast to the girl’s mobility, he is always immobile. For example, he ’stood, transfixed, on the platform’. This could mean the platform of the metro, in a literal sense. Alternatively, it could at the dock as the girl floats away. The speaker feels stuck.

         Also, a key piece of imagery is the ending line: “with a shopping bag dangling from my hand…”. This gives a lot of insight into the speaker’s emotions. The shopping bag could represent a dangling shackle, or something else that weighs him to earth. He is weighed down by his commitment to his family. To add, he is not firmly gripping the handle of the shopping bag – it’s merely dangling. This may be another comment on love as a commitment and burden, and also the ease of letting it go. Even he, who it seems has a strong stance on commitment, is just barely hanging on to his commitment.

          ‘In the Metro’ represents a distinct and cynical point of view on love. Mikhail Kvilividze speaks through the poem to say that love is a restraining commitment that is difficult to hold on to, and that forces others to long for what is lost. Even those faithful ones, such as the one in this poem (who is sad when the girl is gone, but is naive enough to not comprehend why), feel the pull of the youthful and free sometimes. And, for Kvilividze, the conundrum is cracked.

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