an uncertain entry into both sense and nonsense ñ but she does not
fall.
Sitting on a wall or fence is evocative of situating oneself
between two sides in a position of presumed neutrality yet even this
third space is not neutral or outside of representation. As she sits on
the wall, the speaker is still ëtrapped between the linesí. The poem
alludes to problems with communication in two ways: first, in terms
of the limits of representation, and second, in terms of a problematic
relationship between self and ëotherí. There is a tension between the
ëIí and ëyour eyesí as she creates a division between the person who
reads and the poetic subject. Speared by subjectivity or ëspeared on
the iísí, the way one sees and is seen by others is presented as painful.
The poem suggests that communication cannot communicate since
there is a glitch between the poetic self and language, and the poetic
self who speaks and the ëotherí who ëunderstandsí her.
In Medbh McGuckianís ëOn Ballycastle Beachí (1988) the poetic
speaker imagines how for the reader: ëMy words are traps/ Through
which you pick your way.í^46 Berkeleyís speaker has less control and
appeals to ëyouí the reader or another poetic subject, to recognize her
own entrapment and struggle within language. As the poetry is
marked by a difficulty with communication and the topic of the poem
is understanding or writing itself, the poetic speaker moves towards
exceeding herself in a language that provides both the excess and the
limitations. The beyond of language is what she cannot escape from
and so she reaches out to ëyouí as the ëotherí who will grasp this
painful excess. This is not a purely aesthetic undertaking since her
need for the eyes of the ëotherí introduces an ethical dimension
whereby the alterity of language reaches out to the alterity of an
ëotherí or, in this case, to the alterity of the reader or a particular
reader born in mind by the poet. Berkeleyís poetry can be understood
in terms of versing and conversing: in her call to the ëotherí who will
see or hear her words, she appeals to a conversation that will initiate
an ethical relation with the ëotherí since language is not her language
but always the language of someone else. Like Levinas, Berkeley
notices how language is not a private medium but something public
46 Medbh McGuckian, ‘On Ballycastle Beach’, On Ballycastle Beach (Meath:
Gallery, 1988), pp.61–2.