Guest Blog: From Sherman Alexie's Totem Sonnets (Commonplace Book)

From his book "The Summer of Black Widows" (Hanging Loose Press).

Lenny
Edgar Bearchild
Holden Caulfield
Tess

The Misfit
Sula
Mazie
Tayo

Cacciato
Cecelina Capture
Hamlet
Jim Loney

Daredevil
The Incredible Hulk

Wikipedia says this about the order of figures on a totem pole: 'Vertical order of images is widely believed to be a significant representation of importance. This idea is so pervasive that it has entered into common parlance with the phrase "low man on the totem pole". This phrase is indicative of the most common belief of ordering importance, that the higher figures on the pole are more important or prestigious. A counterargument frequently heard is that figures are arranged in a "reverse hierarchy" style, with the most important representations being on the bottom, and the least important being on top. Actually there have never been any restrictions on vertical order, many poles have significant figures on the top, others on the bottom, and some in the middle.'

I like the cognitive dissonance of this "Totem Sonnet" form. In sonnets we think of the final couplet as being the two most important lines. But as wikipedia notes, most of us are programmed to think of totem poles as being oriented in the opposite direction: the icons are more "prestigious" the higher you climb. In this particular sonnet, that cognitive dissonance allows the stanza's final couplet to work like a punchline -- a list consisting of twelve appropriately "literary" fictional icons concludes, unexpectedly, with two comic-book characters. This is surely the only sonnet in published history whose final line contains the phrase "The Incredible Hulk."