Looking at “Woodchucks”
The poem “Woodchucks” by Maxine Kumin was interesting to read for me. It was funny and light-hearted in the style it was written. The poem was about woodchucks eating all the vegetables in the garden and the frustration of the author to rid themselves of the woodchucks. I was surprised at the feelings that came out of the author. The base feelings we have as humans to protect what is ours even from nature and the attempt to control nature. The confusion of the author as to what to do with the woodchucks is fascinating. They had tried gassing them first and the woodchucks were smart enough to dig another tunnel to hide in until it was safe. It is the ultimate battle between man and nature. It shows the deepest feeling of satisfaction at the death of another animal, but we do not see ourselves as animals.
It is interesting that the baby was the first to fall under the bullet. This seems to be showing that the female is strong and smart and that this is a feminist poem. When in line 15 the author makes a comment about “falling from grace” it is reminiscent of the religious stories and then in the next line to talk about Darwin was very ironic and carefully done. The author then tells us that he died under the rose bushes, which turns something beautiful and natural into a gravesite which is usually thought of as sad.
Then the author manages to get the mother with the gun and, although the baby is described in plain language, the mother is seen as more negative with, “…her needle teeth still hooked in a leaf of early Swiss chard.” (ln.20-21). So now the mother is now not only harder to get to and stronger and smarter, but more vicious and determined to keep the food she has risked her life for. Although there is another baby woodchuck that is killed it is almost said in passing as though this is commonplace to take one life after another. This time there is no depiction of how it looked once it died or how well the aim was. It is then that the author recognizes the killer within and the protection instinct and adrenaline that helped her along to murder these woodchucks.
Then we are left with only the one woodchuck. The author specifies that it is a male woodchuck, rather “old” and “wily” (ln. 25). The fact that the older male woodchuck is left directly contradicts the idea that this is a femi9nist poem. The author is so frazzled by this fact that she sits out there day after day with her weapon and waits to see him again. Even when she sleeps she dreams about this one woodchuck and wonders why they could not have died in the easier way which is the gas that she first attempted to use before the story even began.
When the last line comes up I have to wonder if the author is writing it because of a sense of guilt for killing these woodchucks by shooting them or if she sees them as the same level as the Jewish population that died by the gas chamber. This story was written in 1972 which was only about 30 years after WWII ended. Many people would have still been around that remembered that time and may have gotten upset about the way that she worded the poem at the end. I’m not sure of the message that was intended but I know that it seems to me that she was showing that you can only feel regret after you have done something wrong, before that you feel righteous.
