#6: Four by Robert Creeley (Critical)

My favorite poem in this week’s packet was “Four” by Robert Creeley

Four

This number for me
is comfort, a secure
fact of things. The

table stands on
all fours, the dog
walks comfortably,

and two by two
is not an army
but friends who love

one another. Four
is a square,
or peaceful circle,

celebrating return,
reunion,
love’s triumph


I like this poem because of its simplicity. Creeley expresses a desire to have things in represented in even numbers, in groups of four in particular. I think most people can relate to this sentiment. For some reason things just make more sense and seem more orderly or contained when grouped this way. Just as Creeley suggests, “it’s a secure fact of things.” I particularly like the first two stanzas and I liked that it was written in tercets. I think that coupled the line breaks and punctuation added to the poem making it easy to get through as well as understand. I also found it ironic that Creeley stressed the importance of the number four yet chose to write this poem in tercets instead of quatrains.