Extra Credit: Joanna Klink

One of the poems Joanna Klink read from her book was entitled “And Having Lost Track.” The poem begins with the line: “And having lost track, I walked toward the open field. Now transparent, now far, the day-moon burned through the waste air.” This clip, standing alone, may have no significant value. However, when looking at the context of the rest of the poem, we can see that Klink often uses nature and the vastness of the outdoors to convey messages of solitude, peace, and serenity. In this particular line, she uses very basic elements (open field, moon, air) to portray a basic scene, to show the calm of the place she turns to when she “loses track.” Though vague, she is able to convey her message. Often, we look for minute details to be able to conjure an image or scene being described, but this is not the case with this poem.

In the conclusion of “And Having Lost Track”, Klink states “that we only exist. That we do not have the means. And are free to take place.” By this, we are shown that we do indeed merely exist in the vastness of our world. As humans, often there is nothing we can do but be as we are, where we are, and exist. Perhaps this is where we ought to be, without attempting to control every aspect of this world, even aspects that we may know very well are uncontrollable. We take place in a world where much is out of our reach, out of our control, and sometimes the best thing to do is sit back and simply exist.