Social Distancing

Due to the unique arrangement of the lines in “Social Distancing,” this analysis will follow the line order of the audio version of the poem read by Herrera, available via the Academy of American Poets ("Social Distancing"). Thus, since the reading the poem begins with the line, “grocery bags have a tendency to wobble,” that will serve as Line 1 in this analysis.

At 13 lines, “Social Distancing” is a relatively short poem designed to be both read and interpreted in any number of ways. In a quotation paired with the poem by the Academy of American Poets, Herrera explains, “The solar circle poem can be read in any direction, or simultaneously with various voices at a ‘distance,’ or it can be cut out and spun like a wheel.” The unique design of the poem on the page allows for various readings and thus, a wide range of interpretations. Indeed, Herrera lays out as his vision that readers might actually take the poem off the page, altering it even further. To honor the intention behind the arrangement of the poem, this analytical section describes several key features of the poem without attempting to chronologically or linearly order the poem.

Though completely void of punctuation, Herrera’s poem is made up of 13 distinct statements. These independent clauses take slightly different syntactical shapes and tenses yet contain a similar rhythmic quality as one reads the poem. Most lines are about the same length—between five and eight words—although the short line in the center of the sun is distinct in placement and length: “Healing begins” (Line 13). The choice of line length and structure helps implicitly achieve Herrera’s goal of fostering multiple readings, since all 12 lines, or rays, around the center of the poem can be seen as equal to one another. This helps readers understand that the intention is for the lines to be read in different orders; there is no hierarchy or schema to follow. The central line can be considered a starting or an ending point—or even as the beginning to each of the “ray” lines stemming from it—which increases the options of how the poem can be read.

Thematically, not all of the lines share the same content, though the overall tone of the poem can be somewhat contained by the centeral line about the origin of healing. Several of the images of the poem are simple: “grocery bags” (Line 1), “the toy section” (Line 2), “a chile bowl” (Line 6). In contrast, other lines contain abstract emotional descriptions: “fear dissolves and trust walks in” (Line 10) and “freedom blossoms in all its colors” (Line 7). The actions around the more concrete images, though, have a similar emotional quality to the more philosophical ones. In each line, something is moving: There is an action toward something. Despite the fact that each line physically leads away from the center of the sun, the action of each surrounding line seems critically related to the healing that is beginning. Even the poem’s title contains a gerund— a word derived from a verb, but which acts as a noun—so that the phrasing is both a noun yet still implies some movement: a “distancing.” The action-oriented language of the poem is connected to the central line in an important way; “healing” is conceptualized as a physical motion to which people aspire or can experience. Taken together with the literal meaning of “social distancing,” the poem contains a clear message about how people can manage the complex emotional experience of isolation during a pandemic.

The shape of the poem, a sun, or “solar circle” as Herrera describes above, is a striking feature of the form and content of the text. At first glance, the poem can appear to contain only one line—“Healing begins” (Line 13)—with rays of meaningless language spreading outward. Upon further investigation, though, each ray of text contains its own message and connection to the rest of the poem. Many of these lines contain language that seems to be opening outward with verbs like “create” (Line 3), “blossoms” (Line 7), “rises and accelerates” (Line 9), and “flourish” (Line 12), among others. This specific use of language accentuates the shape of the poem: It beams the sunlight outward and each individual line is intended as a bright image or idea going toward the reader. The shape is also referential to the title; the sun is a distant object to the earth yet can also be seen as close because of how humans, plants, and animals experience the sun’s light. Metaphorically, the use of the sun as a concrete shape for the poem illustrates a key theme of the poem: “Social distancing” implies both being separate from and being close to other people.

The concept of proximity is also developed in the poem through particular images and the use of perspective. In several lines, Herrera describes mundane items or locations: “grocery bags” (Line 1), “a chile bowl” (Line 6), and “the toy section” (Line 2). Despite being a primarily philosophical poem, these representations help create a sense of normalcy for the reader; these are items that might be in one’s own home, or places to which moat people might go. In this way, a highly abstract poem is grounded in the day-to-day physical reality that people experience, building the ideas and making the poem more relatable. This helps establish the poem’s themes as attainable or close for the reader, which Herrera uses to his advantage as he offers more abstract concepts. In a shift to the first-person plural perspective in Line 8, Herrera describes “the power between us” as a way of connecting people and pushing forward his idea that the “social distancing” in the title is actually the vehicle towards the “healing” (Line 13) that he hopes to see.