Bag of Bones

At the heart of “Bag of Bones” is an individual tragedy that represents countless similar tragedies. The setting of the mass grave site—in which the unnamed woman has just discovered her loved one’s remains at the poem’s opening—immediately sets up a powerful contrast between the anonymity of mass death and the individuality of the life that was lost. The speaker points out that the bag of bones the unnamed woman holds is “like all other bags / in all other trembling hands” (Lines 5-6), drawing the reader’s attention to how depressingly common such searches for human remains have become in this unnamed woman’s country. Just as the woman and her quest represent the many other grieving relations and their own quests for remains, so too does the skull and bones she collects represent the many other anonymous victims of this violence: The victim’s bones are “like thousands of bones / in the mass graveyard” (Lines 7-8). This zooming out from the singular example to the general situation demonstrates to the reader how an individual tragedy connects to and mirrors the national collective tragedy.