There's No Such Thing as "Mundane"

Mundane is in the eye of the beholder. I am speaking of course about its more popular definition, "relating to, characteristic of, or concerned with commonplaces; ordinary," according to the American Heritage online dictionary. Its original definition, "of, relating to, or typical of this world; secular," might allow it to exist. I haven't yet decided.

As a poet, the mundane is a wide-open field. Love, hate, courage, fear, jealousy and beauty have been written about since humans first figured out how to write on cliff walls with plant juice. That's a lot of poetry. But how many have written about a discarded gasoline pump, a table of pottery, a train crossing, an old mill wheel, an abandoned shack, a construction site or a table of vegetables? Sure I write poems with love or nature as their themes, but I live for the mundane.

I think I get this perspective from my photographic eye. A great photographer can see beauty or insight in a very narrow piece of the overall view. I think it is a poet's duty to do the same, but on a humanistic scale.

My own view of the universe is also involved. An uncountable number of events has led up to each moment we perceive, each item we see, each thought we contemplate. "There are eight million stories in the naked city," according to the classic 1948 film "Naked City," but those are just the people. They interact with the world and each other, making my domain incalculable.

When I look at a dilapidated shack, and there are thousands here in Kansas, I don't just see broken window panes and warped walls. I see what was at one time a home for a loving family, and I wonder what made them leave. I spy a bubble gum wrapper rolling with the breeze along the street, and I picture the 6-year-old boy whose mom just couldn't chase down the wrapper when her son let it go. An odd-shaped tower attached to a large rustic house is where my imagination places a nineteenth-century scientist in a private laboratory.

Possible past events and stories are not the only things that make the mundane interesting for me. There is a world of metaphor to explore as well. Material things can represent ideals or failures, or can be a looking glass to the human condition. A dried, dormant grapevine can be seen as a statement about people resting before rising from their despair. A window framing a view of a mountain or canyon may also be a window to one's soul. A faded wooden arrow pointing to Denver may also be pointing to the future. A lone bicyclist in a picturesque canyon may represent contentment or human drive.

When I'm told I have an unusual take on a mundane subject, which happens more than occasionally, I usually reply that there is no such thing as "mundane." The concept has been expunged from my awareness.