Martin’s off on vacation, so I’m taking over for him… I’ll start with a poem from a most un-Martinish source: The Grateful Dead’s

from the album ‘American Beauty’, 1970.

Analysis

The first verse, addressing the listener, is about song, about listening to the song and making it your own. Hunter begins the verse by invoking the elements of song: words and tune, so that the listener is prepared to think about the song. The poet expresses concern that the song be sung by other people, opening up a discussion of the relationship between the singer and the listener, who will also, it is hoped, come to be the singer, in turn. So the relationship between poet and reader is unity; they are both the poet. In this way, the original poet breaks out of mortality, since his thoughts will continue to generate new thoughts.

The next verse continues this theme, but points out that the identification between singer and listener can never be total, since it is questionable whether any of the original poet’s thoughts will actually occur to the person who is now singing the song. But the poet concludes that even though ‘the thoughts are broken,’ it is worthwhile to have songs.

The chorus is the main puzzle of the song, as highlighted by the title. It is set apart formally from the rest of the song, being a seventeen-syllable haiku. Following the first two verses, it suggests that thought is like a ripple, not caused by anything, and doomed to be fleeting, not to be held. Hunter chose an Asian verse form to express this idea, which is contrary to Western civilization’s principle of logical, rational thought: it is not worthwhile to believe that reason can be imposed on thinking, or that anything reasonable can come from thinking, since communication of thought will always be flawed.

The next two verses introduce new themes. The first contains a benediction, wishing the listener a “full cup,” or a happy life. This cup, moreover, can be refilled at a fountain which, since it was not made by human hands, represents a cosmic or universal level of being. The next verse takes the song from the universal back to the individual. The path between dawn (birth) and dark (death) is a metaphor for life, each life being individual.

The chorus follows, and in this context the ripple has become a symbol of an individual life, caused by nothing a disappearing back into still water, back into the fountain not made by people. A life is a ripple. All life is still water. The chorus, then, is interpreted differently each time. The first time a ripple is a thought in an individual mind; the second time a ripple is an individual life in the pool of universal life.

The final verse conveys optimistic hopelessness. The poet is compassionate, as shown by the last line, but wants us to realize that there are no guarantees about life.

– David Dodd, http://arts.ucsc.edu/GDead/AGDL/ripple.html

Notes

‘still water’ and ‘if your cup be empty’ both seem to be references to Psalm 23, poem #218

‘You who choose to lead must follow’
cf. Mark, Chapter 10, vv. 43 and 44:

“…and whosoever would be first among you must be slave of all.”

and also a passage from the Tao te Ching:

    "Therefore, desiring to rule over the people,
    One must in one's words humble oneself before them
    And, desiring to lead the people,
    One must, in one's person, follow behind them."

‘that path is for your steps alone’
compare with this quote from Whitman’s “Song of Myself” (46):

“Not I–not anyone else, can travel that road for you, You must travel it for yourself.”

Links

Psalm 23: poem #218

An extremely detailed essay on ‘Ripple’, with line-by-line annotations, can be found at http://arts.ucsc.edu/GDead/AGDL/dowling.html

David Dodd maintains the Annotated Grateful Dead Lyrics page at
http://arts.ucsc.edu/gdead/agdl/gdhome.html