I’ve always loved “The Mall” by Evelyn Lau published in The Walrus a few years ago.The poem, on the surface, describes the narrator’s experience of visiting a mall.
The narrator begins, “Today, I choose it over the ocean.” She then lists all the facets of nature she chose the mall over. She writes,
“Over the trees, their fall leaves
a flock of orange parrots perched on branches.
Over the chandelier of sunlight broken
on blue waves, over flowers”
In the mall, though, the narrator “skate[s]” the “arid walkways” like a “Zombie”–half dead, half alive.
She writes,
“The stores hold their mouths open
like seductresses, radiating heat and light
and a bright array of wares,”
The mall offers a visual, seductive, but unfeeling world. Sensation is mostly absent.
Later, the narrator returns to “what’s left of the world” and the ocean air “pours over her like pain.” The reader now begins to understand the narrator’s conflict–nature is so full of sensation that the narrator finds it painful. Perhaps sensation reminds her of her living body. The mall, though, provides the perfect antidote of dissociation.
The Vocation 