Poetry Analysis

Whirlpool

My mind is becoming a whirlpool,

My emotions spinning round and round,

Logic becoming unimportant,

Memories lost and found.

Deeper I find myself going,

I’m beginning to lose control,

The water beneath is drowning me,

I’m struggling to save my soul.

The current is keeping tight hold of me,

It’s pulling me down where I don’t want to go,

I’m trying to swim, but it’s hurting me,

I’ll stay in the confusion even so.

My head is just above the water,

I’m fighting and inside I’m so sore,

It’s so cold, the waves are cutting me,

But still I go back under for more.

I know that voices are calling me,

But under water how could I hear,

My heart is saving me from hatred,

My strength is saving me from fear.

Within me  I am crying,

I’m scared that you don’t know,

Can’t let go, I’m drowning,

The words would hurt me even more.

The poem I chose to analyze was one that my mom wrote, titled ‘Whirlpool’. Right after reading it, I am going to automatically say that the poem is about depression. Here are my reasons:

Depression is often described as a drowning feeling- drowning in your own sadness and emotions while no one else can see you. “What is depression like?” “It’s like drowning, and being able to see everyone else breathing.” So why a whirlpool? When you get depressed, most times you feel confused and very misunderstood. Confusion can also be the CAUSE of the depression itself. If we are still relating to water, then a whirlpool is a very good representative of this.

Stanza 1

Simply the beginning of the poem describing what your mind literally feels like when you are depressed. Logic DOES become unimportant because you get so stressed out that you don’t think things through. Memories do trigger depression, and if you remember something while you are depressed, it makes things considerably worse depending on the memory.

Stanza 2-3

If you can’t pull yourself out of depression quickly, it does kind of control you and how you act towards others. You tend to be more cranky and distant. The water represents the depression- the drowning sensation, as I explained above, is how you feel. Suicidal thoughts sometimes follow depression- so if my mom ever reached that point, she may have literally been struggling to save herself.

Depression will drag you down and isolate you from those you love, because you are far more withdrawn, trying often times to hide your sadness. No one WANTS to be depressed, it’s just a mental disorder that some have no control over.

Stanza 4

When you fight depression, you can “surface” a few times and think you are out of the water before another wave hits and you’re “back under” again. You do get tired easily when fighting depression, and often times you’ll end up shutting down. However, since depression can’t be controlled, you have no choice but to get dragged back down along with your feelings and emotions.

Stanza 5-6

“Voices calling” could be a reference to friends and family reaching out to her to try to help her. Often times, you will ignore everyone around you when you are depressed because you feel that they don’t understand and also don’t want to burden them with your problems as well. Therefore, you must rely on saving yourself. In the end, this results in hidden emotions… and as the poem ends with drowning, it closes out on not wanting to be comforted because almost anything can trigger someone who is already depressed.