The Fish

Elizabeth Bishop was a close observer of the world around her, and her poetry reflects this, if it is not defined by it. Bishop was drawn to the natural world, which was conducive to solitude, contemplation, and quiet revelation. As with two of her poetic influences, Hopkins and Moore, Bishop felt compelled to describe the natural world with an almost scientific precision. This attempt to render in words the complexities of nature led to poems layered with startling images and striking connections between seemingly disparate things.

In Bishop’s poem “The Fish,” as in other of her poems such as “The Moose” and “The Armadillo,” there is a sudden intersection of the human and animal worlds, which pulls the speaker out of the everydayness of her life and propels her into another realm. This jarring meeting with an animal life, drawn up from the depths of the water, reveals a glimpse into a world that seems somehow more unified than fractured. The speaker’s connection to the deep, though the fish, reveals a deeper connection to life as well. In these poems, as in “The Fish,” the speaker experiences the thrill that comes from feeling connected to something larger than the self.

In “The Fish,” as with Bishop’s other poems that focus on the natural world, there is the initial sense of an intrusion, whether the intrusion be the human into the animal world, or the animal suddenly thrust into the human realm.