ABSTRACT
Marianne Moore, in her long poem "Marriage," and Muriel Rukeyser, in the even longer "U. S. 1," use documentary collage as a form of evidence, staking out a position for poetry that attempts to bridge the gap between "fact" and "truth." In these two works, each distinctive in its author's oeuvre, both female poets reject the older, sentiment-based model of "feminine" poetry and instead cultivate an apparently objective and disinterested position with regard to the subject matter; formally, they both use documentary collage, the direct citation of outside source material. Moore's early interest in the sciences led her to bring the habits of observation, particularly observation of the physical world to the craft of poetry. Rukeyser's "The Book of the Dead" is a very strong example of politically motivated documentary collage poetry. Moore and Rukeyser both respond to questions similar to those asked by two theorists of ways in which individuals may view, and respond to, images of human suffering.
