Summary
"The Bull" is written as a first-person recounting of the speaker's decision to delve into his own depths, represented by the bull. In the beginning of the poem, the speaker describes the bull standing alone in the backyard. The animal is so dark that the night purples around him. The speaker has no choice but to step outside and join the bull. Wind blows through branches as the bull watches the speaker with kerosene-blue eyes.
Forgetting he has no language, the speaker asks the bull what it wants. In response, the bull just breathes "to stay alive." The speaker states he is a boy, which is equated to being a murderer of his childhood. He goes on to say that like all murderers, his god is stillness.
The bull remains where he stands, like something prayed for by a man without a mouth. The green-blue eye of the animal is described as a lamp that swirls in its socket. Not wanting the bull and not wanting the bull to be beautiful, the speaker professes a need for beauty to be more than hurt, and gentle enough to want. The poem culminates in a reaching, not towards the bull, but towards the depths: an entrance the shape of an animal. This entrance is compared to the speaker himself.
Analysis
"The Bull" is a rendition of Vuong's progression toward self-realization, as recounted in the Zen story of "The Ten Bulls." With a series of images and poems, "The Ten Bulls" describes the steps toward enlightenment: the search for the bull, the discovery of footprints, the perception and catching of the bull, the taming and riding that ensues, the transcendence of the self and of the bull, the reaching of the source, and finally the return to the world with this new understanding. In Time is a Mother, "The Bull" remains relevant throughout because it is in the epigraph poem. Several important themes are outlined that appear throughout the collection: beauty and discomfort, the importance of outlines themselves, and the self as a doorway.
The bull stands alone in "the backyard," a space that exists outside but still in a private place. The speaker opening the door and stepping outside represents him embarking on the steps toward self-actualization, or self-knowing. His statement that he has no choice contrasts with a later poem in the collection, "Tell Me Something Good," in which the speaker states, "You can walk away. You can be nothing // & still breathing. Believe me" (Lines 33-34). As "The Bull" functions as the entire collection's epigraph, it is in conversation with all the other poems.
The color palette of the poem is established in the first description of the bull: "so dark / the night purpled around him" (Lines 1-2). The bull has "kerosene / -blue eyes," which signals a possibility of danger (Lines 5-6). Kerosene is a combustible liquid often kept in blue containers that is used as fuel. Later in the poem, the eye of the bull is described as a "green-blue lamp / [swirling] in its socket" (Lines 13-14). The cool colors in this poem (shades of green, blue, and purple) are evocative of the ocean, and thus, by homonym, of the poet himself.
The speaker asks the bull what it wants, forgetting that he (the speaker) has no language. This part is rather abstract, but it could refer to the perspective in philosophy concerning the failure of language, the poet's own experience with literacy and bilingualism, and the poet's mother's illiteracy. In an interview with author Viet Thanh Nguyen for the Los Angeles Review of Books, Vuong states, "I had to learn, living in an illiterate family, to communicate through presence." The communication that occurs through presence—as well as the focus on language, illiteracy, and the act of writing—appears throughout the collection.
Being a boy is equated to being a murderer of childhood. This suggests a feeling of self-blame for something inevitable, but it also opens up the idea of what childhood is. There is the actual time of childhood, and then there are the qualities associated with this time (innocence, wonder, exploration). The word "murderer" introduces an abrupt violence. The speaker states that like all murderers, his god is stillness. In a play on words, the poet then writes, "My god, he was still / there" (Lines 11-12). This clarifies the preceding line; in what is both an exclamation and an explanation, the speaker's "god" is made out to be the bull.
The description of the green-blue lamp swirling in the socket of the bull's eye introduces a symbol that will appear later in the collection: a bullseye on the speaker's body. For example, in "Dear Rose," an arrowhead pierces the speaker's back. A bullseye represents a target. Placed on a body, implies violence. However, Vuong transforms and redefines this violence as an opening.
Despite not wanting the bull or its beauty, the speaker reaches—not towards the bull, but "the depths" (Line 20). This act of reaching does not seek direct answers or a final arrival at self-actualization. Rather, it is a reaching toward "an entrance the shape of / an animal. Like me" (Lines 21-22). This notion of outlines, entrances, and doorways plays an important role throughout the collection.
