I’ve chosen to look at the poem ‘San Francisco’, which although was only found by Brautigan in a Laundromat in San Francisco, I think, reflects Brautigans style and portrayal of the city very well. When I first read ‘San Francisco’, the repetitive style and rhythm made me want it to continue and go on. The tone is almost cheeky, flirty and is more upbeat than Brautigan’s poetry, that is until the final line ‘it was lonely’. Of course this depends on how we read the poem, as this may not be a stark, jolting depressive line intended to leave the reader pondering and reflecting perhaps the isolation and loneliness one can feel in a city such as San Francisco. Instead we could read this line as a jovial take on San Francisco life and everyday details so important to the inhabitants of the city, such as laundry.
This suits the black comedy and satirical touch always present in Brautigan’s poetry.This all fits well with beat image of counter culture, straying from the mainstream and finding humour in darker places. The Laundromat seems to work so well in this poem as it symbolises the working people, the everyday lives of those in the city, and the underlying meanings of these everyday occurrences. This is what Brautigan seems to do much of his poetry; taking something small and reading between the lines, whether it is sleeping, eating or sex.
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This might be by far my (2nd) favorite poem. I keep re-reading it and it takes on new meaning. I first I thought the speaker does it all on accident. Then I thought he put the clothes in the water out of spite for the person who first mixed up the machines. But now I think after reading your post and then again reading it that he did it for the washing machine, as if he really cared whether the washing machine had a purpose in life with all that unused water sitting inside. Is the speaker a sentimental soul who believes the washing machine has a sentient essence, or is he a radical ecoterrorist man-handling innocent peoples clothes in an attempt to conserve water? Could go wither way in Frisco.
This is such a great poem. I always think of it, for one reason or another, as "sassy," much like your description of it as a little cheeky. It really seems like somthing that you would write to someone in a laundromat. The tone does seem to capture Brautigan's use of the everyday-yet-strange in his poems and the satirical nature of his writing. Wish I would find a poem like this in a laundromat. Great analysis!
Flora... yes, the contrast between the seemingly-casual, "cheekiness" of messing with the conventional laundromat system (no one's working their own machines!) is a lot of fun. On one hand, there's a real sense of community, everyone looking out for everyone else' well-being (although, is dumping someone else's clothes into a machine full of water a positive or negative gesture?); but on the other hand, "it was lonely." Is this supposed to be sarcastic? Or is it dark? Or perhaps it's both...at once. I wonder if thinking about any of the other poems would make us lean one way or the other...
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