Another Reason Why I Don’t Keep A Gun In The House

Fiction | Poem | Adult | Published in 2003

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Summary

Background

Poem Analysis

Themes

Symbols & Motifs

Literary Devices

Themes

Overcoming Annoyance

As the reader learns from the title of the poem, it’s a good thing the speaker fails to have a gun in their house, or they would not learn the important lesson of managing annoyance. If the speaker had had a gun, there is a possibility they would have shot the neighbor’s barking dog, thereby terminating their opportunity for growth. By meditating on the “muffled” (Line 8) bark, the speaker transforms it into something both miraculous and humorous. The dog “[sits] there in the oboe section barking” (Line 14). If the speaker had ended the dog’s life, they might never realize that even the most annoying situations have life lessons to offer. The speaker would never have seen the bark as artistic or had the image of the dog as a musician.

According to renowned meditation teacher Joseph Goldstein, this poem “addresses the attempt to incorporate a nuisance sound” (Stark, Gail Andersen. Creating a Life of Integrity, 2020) and is a good example of how allowing an annoying sound to exist enables the listener to accept it rather than fight against it. Goldstein acknowledges his own frustration with a noisy leaf blower disrupting his meditation and compares it to the barking dog in Collins’s poem. Both sounds, Goldstein suggests, spark agitation in the listener. However, after concentrating on such a sound, and incorporating it as an object of meditation, both Collins’s speaker and Goldstein accept them as part of life’s rich symphony. The bark and the leaf blower are part of the impermanent music of the ordinary.

Coping with Loss

Collins did not title the poem “Why I Don’t Keep A Gun In the House,” but added the phrase “Another Reason.” This addition is significant and informs readers of the speaker’s struggles. Initially, interpretation of the title has to do with the speaker’s extreme annoyance. The speaker doesn’t keep a gun in the house because they might act out and shoot the dog for its insistent yelp. This may show the speaker as grateful for the lack of the gun because its absence allows him to have his imaginative vision of the dog as a musician. However, the phrase “another reason” lets the reader know that there are additional reasons for keeping the gun out of the house. Generally, it is not advised for those with depression to keep a gun in the house as they might use the gun on themselves. Also, if a person has anger-management issues, it might be ill-advised to have a gun. This gives the poem an added emotional tension. The speaker, perhaps along with being annoyed by the dog, may identify with its distress over the owners’ leaving. The root of the dog’s distress could be similar to their own. This could account for the speaker’s eventual need to transform the dog from nuisance to bringer of beauty. Although the title cues the reader into the humor in the poem, it also suggests the speaker is dealing with deeper issues than first might appear.

Artistic Beauty in Strange Places

In “Another Reason Why I Don’t Keep A Gun in the House,” the speaker, as a listener, is like one of the musicians who marvels in “respectful / silence” (Lines 17-18) at the “endless coda” (Line 19) of the dog’s solo. The poem, which started out as describing irritation, ends by engaging the reader in the speaker’s playful act of listening to the “famous barking dog solo” (Line 18), which elevates the purpose of the dog’s noise. One does not expect irritation to shift into the sublime, but that seems to be Collins’s point. Transformative art and beauty can be found anywhere. This goes along with Collins’s philosophy about making poems centered on “everyday moments, caught in time,” as shown in his 2012 TED talk (see the Further Resources section for a link).

Often, people ignore or do not catch moments of beauty because remaining in the moment can be a challenge. The dog’s barking is, in reality, very annoying, but it is transformed by the way the speaker views it. The speaker makes the noise into something notable, imaginatively giving it artistic depth. Transforming something frustrating into something enlightening is one of the great purposes of art. Collins’s barking dog is a surprising and unlikely subject, but the discussion of transformative power is eternal.