Dear Readers,
In July of 2011 I shared this poem with you and it remains one of my most popular blog posts of all time. The Facebook Sonnet by Sherman Alexie originally appeared in The New Yorker back when I was still subscribing to the magazine. (If you’re curious about why I no longer subscribe read this. I don’t hold back.) The Facebook Sonnet has become a controversial poem that readers tend to either love or hate. See what you think.
The Facebook Sonnet
Welcome to the endless high-school
Reunion. Welcome to past friends
And lovers, however kind or cruel.
Let’s undervalue and unmend
The present. Why can’t we pretend
Every stage of life is the same?
Let’s exhume, resume and extend
Childhood. Let’s all play the gamesThat preoccupy the young. Let fame
And shame intertwine. Let one’s search
For God become public domain.
Let church.com become our church.Let’s sign up, sign in and confess
Here at the altar of loneliness.
————-
As you can see, this poem packs a wallop. I tend to agree that we are some of the loneliest people in history and are in danger of forgetting how to connect to real people in real ways.
However, as an author, social media–in all its many forms–is a way for me to connect to my readers. Like many things in our modern world, facebook can be both a blessing and a curse. (Do we really need to see a photo of what you had for lunch?) Yet when faced with blessings and curses, I try to keep my eye on the blessing column.
The blessing for me is this: I’ve had some wonderful exchanges with readers on facebook, goodreads, twitter and pinterest. Of course, it helps that I tend to spend most of my time writing, instead of hanging out on social media sites, so I don’t have time to get too weary of them.
What about you? Do you think The Facebook Sonnet by Sherman Alexie has any truth to it? As always, I’d love to hear from you.
P.S. In the interest of irony, you can “like” my facebook author page here. 😉
Susan Gabriel is the acclaimed author of The Secret Sense of Wildflower (named a Best Book of 2012 by Kirkus Reviews) as well as her latest novel, Temple Secrets and five other books. She lives in the mountains of North Carolina.
Nope. I have connected with new people, old friends, and family members I’ve lost complete touch with. I don’t care for political posts but other than that, I see Facebook as a magnificent tool. AND, I would tell Sherman, don’t pick at people who are lonely. Facebook has certainly cheered me up when I’ve felt alone or down.
I hear you, Barbara. I choose to see it as a wonderful tool, too. (Well, most of the time.) Television gets a lot of criticism, too, and is sometimes called a wasteland, but I’ve found a few shows that I really enjoy. The Good Wife anyone?
Thanks for stopping by. I love it when you comment.
I think a great cartoon for the New Yorker (if they haven’t done it already) would show a young couple sitting at a fancy restaurant, not paying any attention to each other but rather looking at their phones in front of them. The caption would be “Modern Dating.”
I got off FB several years ago because I was bored to death. Really don’t care what you look like in the bathroom in the morning, don’t care what cocktail you had for dinner at P.F. Changs and if I see another cat picture–much as I love cats–I’m going to explode. More recently Welsey also got bored with Facebook and left. I told her she would, but she didn’t listen to me.
I’m not on facebook much either, John. I keep thinking I need to show up more (on my author page, at least) and “like” all my friends cat and dog photos, but I just keep finding other things to do. Like writing!
That said, I truly love connecting with friends and readers, but I am always grateful when they make the first move and email me or “like” a blog post or comment on a blog post or whatever. I’m not playing hard to get, I swear. 🙂
Everbody is entitled to their own opinion. No one here is right or wrong.
I agree, Elle. It’s all in how you look at it. Thanks for your comment.
The substance of the sonnet resides in the first and last lines:
Welcome to the endless high school reunion…
[welcome to] the altar of loneliness
What Alexie captures–quite brilliantly–is the fact that we are social animals, but that Facebook is most emphatically not social. It is, in (virtual) reality, an isolated, solitary, and therefore, ultimately empty experience, especially for those seeking social connection, which is impossible without the actual physical proximity of others.
Eloquently said, Robert. I agree. In general, I think people distract themselves with social media to mask how lonely they feel. While we may see names and faces on social media platforms (though not always), perhaps what we really want is to be sitting across from someone real and someone with the capacity to have a deep conversation. At least that’s what I want.
Thanks for commenting.
With every good wish,
Susan Gabriel
It is was toxic—like the us empire that was soulless, empty, and broken. Ontologically vacant.