17 pages • 34 minutes read
Maxine KuminIn the Park
Fiction | Poem | Adult | Published in 1989A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Symbols & Motifs
Grizzly Bear
The grizzly bear in Kumin’s poem appears in Stanzas 2 and 4 and stands as a symbol for death. Bears, particularly grizzly bears, have been a common threat throughout literature and American history. Between 1850 and 1970, “grizzlies were eliminated from 98 percent of their original range. Populations plummeted from an estimated high of 50,000 to between 1,500 and 1,700 today” (“Grizzly Bear.” Center for Biological Diversity). A common threat, bears have often been hunted and killed for the sake of human protection, farm protection, and for the sake of farm animals. Today, it’s common practice to learn how to live with bears, rather than kill them.
Initially introduced in the second stanza with the true story of mountaineer Roscoe Black, the grizzly bear in “In the Park” represents an iconic symbol of the predator. Black, who was hiking, was mauled by a grizzly before he could respond or run away. Similarly, Kumin argues that death acts the same way. One is going about their life when suddenly, almost out of nowhere, death appears. What happens next is how one responds to death, or the grizzly bear. Rather than fight back, Black laid there quiet and still and felt the bear’s heart against his heart. It was a moment of lying face-to-face with death itself. Until death (the bear) rose and walked off, leaving Black alive, or reborn.
The symbol of the bear returns at the end of the poem as a symbol of death for all humans. Regardless of religious belief, there is a bear for each person “In the pitch-dark” (Line 29). Each person awaits their bear (their death) as Black did in Glacier Park. Kumin’s poem ends with the inevitable, commenting on how existence is a waiting game for the one moment of certainty: one’s confrontation with death.
Old Testament
The Old Testament or the Hebrew Bible is a primary text for how to live a moral, ethical life. At its core, it represents God’s promise to Abraham that the Jews are the chosen people. Interpreted by many branches of Christianity and used by Christians as the basis for the coming of Jesus Christ, the Old Testament in Kumin’s “In the Park” represents the simplicity of existence (“It’s a simple world” [Line 22]).
Yet there are constant instances of what the speaker calls “crossovers” (Line 22) in which the afterlife intersects with current existence, which are exemplified by God speaking directly to Old Testament characters (“Moses, Noah, / Samuel” [Lines 18-19]), angels speaking to those on earth, and even animals talking to humans. Standing for a world in which the rules of existence are bent or altered slightly, the speaker claims of the Old Testament that “if there’s a Hell, little is made of it” (Line 25), indicating that Hell is debatable, and if it does exist it’s not very important.
As a symbol, the Old Testament represents the mysterious unknown following death. As the speaker states, “Heaven’s an airy Somewhere” (Line 23), and there is no real mention of Hell or the concept of purgatory, both elements of the New Testament and Christianity. Kumin, who was born into a Reform Jewish household, was raised with the Old Testament (as the speaker claims in Line 17). Furthermore, this text serves as the foundation for the world’s major religions—Judaism, Christianity, and Islam—and is therefore a single unifying source amongst all religions. Kumin, however, connects the Old Testament to Buddhism by illustrating its ambiguity concerning the afterlife. Rather, the text conflates those in the afterlife (angels, God) with those currently in existence, drawing on similarities to Buddhism in which all life is interconnected.
Glacier Park
Like the symbol of the grizzly bear as death, Glacier National Park functions as a symbol throughout the poem to emphasize the moment or place of one’s confrontation with death and journey into the afterlife towards rebirth. Mentioned initially in Stanza 2 and then again in Stanza 4, Glacier Park is a prominent national park in northern Montana near the Canadian border. This wilderness area is known for its glacier carved peaks and valleys that run down through the Rocky Mountains. It’s an area well known for its grizzly bears, and it serves as the location of Roscoe Black’s grizzly bear encounter.
As a symbol, however, Glacier Park becomes much more than a scenic place to hike or view glaciers in North America. When mentioned in Stanza 4, the park is suddenly “In the pitch-dark” (Line 29), and the speaker, using the first-person plural point of view, implicates the reader in the final line of the poem: “each of us waits for him in Glacier Park” (Line 30). Glacier Park suddenly becomes a symbol for the place of confrontation and death. It also represents the moment in which life or death could occur. Like Roscoe Black, Glacier Park is the place where each person will spend 49 days between life and death. Kumin indicates in her poem that there can only be one outcome. Either one reenters the world through rebirth as another living being or one dies completely, exiting the samsara cycle, and reaching nirvana. For all people, regardless of religion or non-religion (“on atheist and zealot” [Line 29]), the confrontation is the same. Therefore, Kumin ends the poem with the symbol of Glacier Park, which stands for this moment of coming face-to-face (or heart-to-heart) with death.
