Kelly is an instructor of creative writing and literature. In this essay, he examines the way that Bell links water and war throughout the poem, only to offer a negation of that connection in the end.

Bell has distinguished himself from other contemporary poets through his focus on a broad view of the human situation, rather than on the events of individual lives. In the poem “View,” for instance, Bell discusses trends, not moments. Such a position is a difficult one for a poem to take, given that individual moments tend to pack more emotional impact, but Bell has always managed to involve readers in social trends by linking them to tangible symbols that reach into their real lives. In the case of “View,” the symbol is water, and the social aspect is the danger posed by terrorism that has come to dominate American political discourse. The...