"Tread the Dark" Poem by David Ignatow

In "Tread the Dark," the first six lines David Ignatow talks about how the world actually is, "Hello, drug addict.../Hello, Mafia.../Hello schizoid person...," filled with crime and victims. What Ignatow is saying is that how can all these people serve society in a positive way? How can we (society) live in a perfect place with all this corruption going on in the world? We have created this house "called the Perfect Form" that perhaps exists only in our imagination. Ignatow talks about not wanting people that do no good to our society, "we want clean earth; get out, get going, get lost." But if we want to clean out the earth, we have to get rid of at least half of society in order to live peacefully and safely, as if that could be at all possible.

In the second stanza, he talks about locking ourselves in our own little world, "and we are going to snuggle up to you/you give us so much comfort and pleasure," we don't want to worry ourselves with crime and poverty. We don't want our lives to be disturbed, "who want to disturb us with their imperfect poems," we want to see only the "pretty" things in life, blinding ourselves to the cruel realities of life. Ignatow wants to wake us up, so we could see that it's not all fun and games...a reality check that takes us away from our "Mr. Roger's neighborhood world."

I felt that the center of the poem could be the four lines in the middle of the second stanza, "it's so distracting from those bastards.../who want to disturb us..." because they contain a lot of energy as opposed to the previous lines. The voice in the poem slows down in the first five lines of this stanza embracing this "poem of perfect form." The next three lines start to pick up energy once again. Once we (the readers) hear the word "bastards," we can feel the energy coming back. As the poem progresses, the energy gets stronger and stronger.

Also, I strongly felt that the enter of the poem could be in the first six lines due to the fact that these are very intense, full of energy. The repetition of the word "Hello," produces a stronger effect in the lines. I was really shocked when I started reading the first few lines because I wasn't expecting the speaker of the poem to be so straight forward, especially when talking about a "raped girl," and a "schizoid person." Knowing how many cases of rape and murder are being committed against women, (especially in Juarez, Chihuahua, MX) and having two relatives that suffer from schizophrenia, I was deeply affected by this. At first, I thought the speaker was judging these victims, but as I continued reading, I figured Ignatow's intention was to put the reality out there in front of our faces---to make us react. A writer, such as Whitman spent his life pointing out the positive side of life, Ignatow on the other hand, points out the negative. He doesn't "go around the bush," nor tries to create a positive outlook in life. He just tells it like it is.