Bluebird

Bluebird: analysis

Introduction

"Bluebird" is a short free-verse poem about a tenderness the speaker keeps hidden. The bluebird lives in his heart and "wants to get out". The speaker holds it down with toughness, whiskey and cigarette smoke. He hides it from the people around him and from the readers who buy his books.

At night he lets it out and speaks kindly to it. The poem ends with a question that turns on the reader: "do / you?" It is a confession that still refuses to confess fully.

Summary

The first stanza opens with the poem's refrain: "there's a bluebird in my heart that / wants to get out". The speaker says he is "too tough for him". He speaks to the bird directly and tells it to "stay in there". He will not let anybody see it.

Lines 7–15 repeat the refrain. This time the speaker pours "whiskey on him" and inhales "cigarette smoke". The people he deals with, "the whores and the bartenders / and the grocery clerks", never know the bird is there. The stanza ends on the broken lines "he's / in there."

The second stanza repeats the refrain and the claim to be "too tough for him". Now the speaker's words to the bird are sharper. He tells it to "stay down". He asks whether it wants to "screw up the / works" or "blow my book sales in / Europe".

Lines 26–37 give the refrain a fourth time. Now the speaker is "too clever". He lets the bird out only "at night sometimes / when everybody's asleep". He tells it he knows it is there and that it should not be sad. Then he puts it back, but it is still "singing a little".

The last lines say he has not "quite let him / die". Speaker and bird "sleep together like / that" with their "secret pact". This is "nice enough to / make a man / weep". The speaker says he does not weep. The poem closes by asking the reader, "do / you?"

Themes and meaning

The central theme is tenderness hidden under toughness. The bluebird stands for something soft in the speaker, such as feeling, hope or a capacity for song. He keeps it shut in "my heart" and refuses to "let anybody see". The refrain shows that the bird's wish to get out never stops. The toughness has to be restated each time.

The poem also shows how the feeling is suppressed. The speaker pours "whiskey on him" and inhales "cigarette smoke". Drink and smoke become ways to drown the bird, not just habits. The people he meets, "the whores and the bartenders", see only the surface. Concealment is presented as a daily routine.

A third theme is toughness as a public role. The speaker worries that the bird will "blow my book sales in / Europe". The line is comic, but it admits that the hard image is partly something he sells. His hardness is performed and protected. This makes the mask look calculated rather than natural.

The poem is also about keeping something alive in secret. The speaker lets the bird out only "when everybody's asleep". He has not "quite let him / die". The two share a "secret pact" and sleep together. Care survives, but only in private and at night.

Finally, the poem both confesses and refuses to confess. By speaking the poem, the speaker shows the reader the bird he says he hides. Yet the ending still denies weeping. The last question, "do / you?", can be read as a challenge or as an invitation. Either way, it suggests the reader may keep a hidden bird too.

Tone

The voice is gruff and conversational. The speaker talks to the bird like a man shouting down a nuisance: "stay in there", "stay down". His claim to be "too tough for him" comes twice, flat and unchanged. The repetition makes it sound like a script he recites.

In the second stanza the tone turns comic. The questions about screwing up "the / works" and his "book sales in / Europe" are sarcastic. They mock the speaker as much as the bird.

From line 28 the voice softens. He tells the bird "don't be / sad", the gentlest words in the poem. He admits the pact is "nice enough to / make a man / weep". Then he denies weeping and pushes the question back at the reader. The ending is wry, guarded and tender at once.

Form and structure

The poem is free verse with no rhyme scheme and no regular metre. The archive's text has 46 lines in 2 stanzas, of 15 and 31 lines. Lines range from 1 to 11 syllables.

Its structure comes from a refrain. "there's a bluebird in my heart that / wants to get out" opens the poem. It returns at line 7, line 16 and line 26. Each return starts a new movement, and each movement ends in a different response to the bird.

The line breaks are abrupt. Single words stand alone, such as "you" in line 6, "he's" in line 14 and "die" in line 37. Phrases are cut mid-thought, as in "mess / me up?" These breaks make the speech sound halting and guarded. Most lines and sentences begin in lower case, which keeps the voice casual.

Poetic devices

Symbol line 1

there's a bluebird in my heart The bird stands for a soft, hopeful part of the speaker. A bluebird is small, bright and a singer, the opposite of the tough man he presents.

Refrain line 7

there's a bluebird in my heart that The opening line returns at the start of each movement. Its return shows the bird's pressure to get out never lets up.

Apostrophe line 4

I say, stay in there The speaker addresses the bird as if it could hear. The inner feeling becomes a second character he must manage.

Metaphor line 9

whiskey on him Pouring whiskey on the bird makes drinking a way of drowning feeling. The habit is shown as deliberate suppression.

Polysyndeton line 11

and the whores and the bartenders The repeated "and" lists the people of the speaker's daily round. None of them knows what he hides.

Enjambment line 14

he's The single word on its own line delays "in there". The pause mirrors the speaker's reluctance to admit the bird exists.

Bathos line 24

you want to blow my book sales in After the heart and the bird, the worry drops to book sales. The comic fall exposes toughness as a selling image.

Personification line 35

he's singing a little The bird still sings, however quietly. The feeling survives the whiskey and the smoke.

Rhetorical question line 46

you? The last word turns from the bird to the reader. It dares the reader to admit the weeping the speaker denies.

Words worth knowing

works

Slang for the whole arrangement or machinery. To screw up the works is to wreck everything the speaker has set up.

Context

Charles Bukowski lived from 1920 to 1994. "Bluebird" has been on americanpoems.com since February 2003. Readers left 15 comments on it between 2005 and 2021.

What readers have said

• Fisher calls the poem the soft side of the dumb thug, and says it answers charges of misogyny and drunken irrelevance. Fisher, 2005
• Leia reads it as gentle and truthful about a softness and innocence most people hide for fear it will be seen. Leia, 2005
• Soorej finds it painful, because the usual acceptance of ill fate is set here against quiet desperation. soorej, 2006
• Nylorac reads the bluebird as the weak, vulnerable self held down by inhibitions, and got a bluebird tattoo as a reminder of it. nylorac, 2006
• Anwar compares the poem to Poe's The Raven, reading both as revelations of a poet's deepest secrets and hidden fears. anwar, 2011