Analysis Of Juggler By Richard Wilbur

In the poem, “Juggler,” Richard Wilbur compares the figure of God to a juggler that manages to control and take care of five red balls, which can be interpreted as a metaphor for our world. Wilbur describes the juggler in a very deferential and admired fashion, which illustrates the speaker’s love and pays tribute to his own God. By using metaphorical language, imagery, descriptive diction, and a very gracious and treasured tone, Wilbur demonstrates the speaker’s admiration for all that God is able to handle and provide for the people He takes care of.

The juggler himself is a metaphor for a God. In lines 6-7, the poem says “it takes a juggler with five red balls to shake up our gravity” meaning that God is the only person who can handle and

control our world and all that it beholds. The speaker then continues to say that the five red balls “[learn] the way of lightness” as the juggler throws them around. Our world and the people in it learn everything they need to as they travel and experience their surroundings. Just as the balls do, we as people gain knowledge as we “wheel on his wheeling hands;” people learn everything they need to via the paths that God carves out for them. The end of the poem reflects the speaker’s admiration for his God by praising how well the juggler can manage a “broom, a plate, and a table,” and these items serve as a metaphor for the weight of the world. God can manage having this weight on his shoulders, and we applaud Him so, just as the boys and girls in the play “stamp” and “shriek” for the juggler. However, even when our worlds come crashing down and seem to be shaken up, as the juggler drops the table, broom and plate that he is holding, the crowd “batter[s] [their] hands” meaning we still hold our faith in God, even when the world isn’t just.
This scene of the poem also depicts imagery, based on the way the speaker describes all that the “juggler” is able to juggle. The verbs included in these last two stanzas create a realm of reality and can stand out to a reader. Wilbur uses words such as “whirls,” “stamp,” and “booms.” By creating such a descriptive setting, the audience is transported to a time where they can imagine watching a juggler perform all these tricks. By implementing such imagery and describing the juggler’s actions in such a manner, the speaker continues to create his own respectful character. With this imagery, the audience is continually provided with language that supports the speaker’s astonishment towards the spectacle that is God, and all the amazing things he is able to accomplish.
The imagery and figurative language of this poem aid in creating a very devout and admiring tone. The speaker refers to the juggler in a very high manner. In the first stanza, when talking about the ball, the speaker says, “falling is what it love's, and the earth falls,” meaning that people themselves are bound to fall, and experience tragedy and heartbreak. However, the juggler takes these balls and whirls them around the heavens, throwing everyone back into the air after it falls, symbolizing that God is always there to “swing a small heaven about his ears” and pick people up whenever they fall. By incorporating this scene into the poem, the speaker expresses his belief that God is great and that he can juggle our world while also making it a wonderful place to live in and be a part of.