Tattoo
Tattoo - meaning Summary
Perception as a Web
Stevens uses the extended metaphor of a spiderlike light to explore perception and the porous boundary between self and world. Light "crawls" over water and snow and under eyelids, weaving "webs" that bind the eyes to flesh and to landscape. The poem suggests vision is not a passive lens but an active, connective force: filaments of sight extend outward and inward, stitching the observer to the observed.
Read Complete AnalysesThe light is like a spider. It crawls over the water. It crawls over the edges of the snow. It crawls under your eyelids And spreads its webs there-- Its two webs. The webs of your eyes Are fastened To the flesh and bones of you As to rafters or grass. There are filaments of your eyes On the surface of the water And in the edges of the snow.
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