Diving into the Wreck

Diving into the Wreck- By Adrienne Rich

I interpreted Rich's poem and her dive into the wreck as her describing a very personal experience of some kind. She writes "I am having to do this not like Cousteau with his assiduous team aboard the sun-flooded schooner but here alone", and she goes into the ocean on her own, which makes it more personal and meaningful. I think that the ladder represents her memory, and it is ever present "the ladder is always there hanging innocently"She is going to revisit a past event in her memory, which is the ship wreck. Once there, she observes and remembers it all. The lines"I came to see the damage that was done, and the treasures that prevail"can represent the treasure as a lesson learned or positive outcome in the face of pain and destruction. Rich ends the poem with " We are, I am, you are by cowardice or courage the one who find our way back to this scene carrying a knife, a camera, a book of myths in which our names do not appear." Her memory of the past has been revisited, whether due to her fear or courage we do not know, but now she has no reason to hold on to that memory. I think the poem deals with acceptance of the past along with embracing change and letting things go in order to move forward. The wreckage is a place of death and destruction, one must move on elsewhere to thrive and flourish.