The Barber
The Barber - meaning Summary
Mundane Moments Turned Uncanny
The Barber turns a routine haircut into a series of dislocated images that slip from the concrete to the symbolic. Ordinary details—clipping, a raincoat—are juxtaposed with intrusive metaphors: a razor personified, a canoe heading for a waterfall, an impending storm. These shifts create a subtle anxiety about agency and potential danger, suggesting how a small domestic scene opens onto broader uncertainties of identity and fate.
Read Complete AnalysesThe barber at his chair Clips me. He does as he goes. He clips the hairs outside the nose. Too many preparations, nose! I see the raincoat this Saturday. A building is against the sky— The result is more sky. Something gathers in painfully. To be the razor—how would you like to be The razor, blue with ire, That presses me? This is the wrong way. The canoe speeds toward a waterfall. Something, prince, in our backward manners— You guessed the reason for the storm.
from Some Trees (1956)
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