Growth and Maturity in at The Fishhouses and in The Waiting Room

Elizabeth Bishop ends her famous poem “One Art” with the lines, “It’s evident the art of losing’s not too hard to master / though it may look like… disaster.” Although “One Art” lists many literal and symbolic forms of loss, the one that becomes the most prominent in Bishop’s poetry is the loss of time. “In the Waiting Room” and “At the Fishhouses both display the relationship between personal development and time passing. In this essay, I intend to explore the different ways in which Bishop uses imagery to demonstrate growth and maturity over time in these poems.

Although these poems “At the Fishhouses,” which was first published in 1947, uses imagery of age and seasons very similar to that in “In the Waiting Room,” which was not written until the 1970s. The poems begin similarly, with the speaker of “At the Fishhouses” saying “Although it is a cold evening, / down by one of the fishhouses / an old man sits netting,” which is suggesting that it is winter, the season of death, and the image of the old man out in the cold reiterates this. Meanwhile, the speaker of “The Waiting Room,” who is implied to be a young Bishop, starts by speaking in very matter-of-fact terms about her surroundings, such as when she says “It was winter. It got dark / early. The waiting room / was full of grown-up people, / arctics and overcoats.” Like in “At the Fishhouses,” these lines suggest that it is the season of death, except in this poem, it is the death of her childhood. Her language moves quickly from that of childhood to that of adulthood in her narrative, and this technique gives the reader a strong sense of her childish stream of consciousness and the antsiness of waiting both to leave the dentist and to grow up.

Likewise, later in “At the Fishhouses,” the speaker comments on the “Cold dark deep and absolutely clear, / the clear gray icy water . . . Back, behind us, / the dignified tall firs begin.” The “dignified tall firs” have grown from seedlings, so the fact that they are literally and metaphorically behind the speaker and the old man suggests that they are even older than the trees. The description of the water is similar to the final stanza of “In the Waiting Room,” when she says “Outside / … were night and slush and cold / and it was still the fifth / of February, 1918.” Here, young Elizabeth is returning to her present after being sporadically bounced around between her past, present, and future––she is neither full adult nor full child, because she is only 6, but is now aware of the growth, being, and understanding of adults after reading National Geographic and hearing her aunt scream. While the line in “At The Fishhouses” suggests certainty with her place in life, this last line of “In the Waiting Room” represents a transition back to reality.

The greatest difference between the two poems is the presence of childishness. While the movement to and from adulthood is central to “In the Waiting Room” since the emphasis is on the transition from childhood to adulthood, childhood is only glazed over in “At the Fishhouses.” After noting the icy water and the firs, the speaker says “Bluish, associating with their shadows, / a million Christmas trees stand/ waiting for Christmas.” The association of the firs behind her with Christmas is a nod to the childhood that is also behind her, but aside from this instance, she stays focused on adulthood in this poem. Meanwhile, in “In the Waiting Room,” young Elizabeth moves back and forth between childhood and adulthood in her language. She first notes how long she has been waiting for her aunt, and she shares with the reader in a childlike manner that she is reading National Geographic because “(she could read).” As the memory of her eyes moving from the science section with the volcano to the high-style section with horses to the culture section featuring the naked women, she is shocked into adulthood by the images of a world she’s not yet a part of. Immediately after she sees the image of the woman’s “horrifying breasts,” she is spurred into womanhood: her aunt’s voice escapes her lips.

While “At the Fishhouses” represents the steady acceptance of this role in the world years later, young Elizabeth is too young to accept this. Although she “ knew that nothing stranger / had ever happened, that nothing / stranger could ever happen,” she returns to childhood as she ponders her upcoming birthday. Ultimately, though, this moment of change has a lasting impact: she cannot help but wonder why it is that she will become a woman, asking herself “Why should I be my aunt, / or me, or anyone? What similarities /… held us all together / or made us all just one?” Although the adult speaker in “At the Fishhouses” may not be able to answer this fully, she does demonstrate the fact that something holds all adults together, and that adulthood must eventually be accepted.

“In the Waiting Room” and “At the Fishhouses both display the relationship between personal development and time passing. However, the first shows the reader how such a connection can be sporadic, while the second demonstrates how it is eventually accepted. Although the two have different perspectives, they both explore the different ways in which Bishop uses imagery to display growth and maturity over time in her poetry.