To Help the Monkey Cross the River

The blank-verse, unrhymed poem consists of one long stanza of irregular line lengths. Unbroken, the poem retains the feel of an cohesive inner dialogue or line of thought. The speaker of the poem is a dramatic persona, whose tone and mood are difficult to define at the poem’s opening. As the poem draws forward, the speaker’s tone is ironic and sarcastic. “To Help the Monkey Cross the River” is an ambiguous poem, with its meaning left intentionally vague. Such a poem invites the reader’s active participation to create meaning. By the end of the poem, the reader is compelled to read the poem again and pay closer attention to its lines to comprehend the full significance. The effect is deliberate; the poet wants the reader to more actively engage with the poem and create meaning. Despite the fact that the poem is open-ended and contains complex ideas, its diction is simple and catchy, and uses inventive phrases such as “snake-speed” (Line 14).

Structuring the poem as a riddle or a puzzle, the speaker deliberately plants a series of red herrings in the poem to keep the reader guessing. In Lux’s signature technique, the lines are tightly worded and spare, the