Youre Missing

Throughout our lives many people experience what it feels like to have someone important leave. It can be from death, abandonment, divorce, or even just drifting apart from others; whichever the case may be many people get some of the same feelings because of it. In most of these feelings we miss the ones that are gone and often times question why they aren’t there anymore. Bruce Springsteen’s “You’re Missing” discusses how when someone is missing everything else can seem so empty and without that other person nothing else is complete.

Within the first couple of lines Springsteen jumps right into the imagery of his poem by letting us know exactly where everything is located and how everything is in its own place, but not the significant other. “Everything is everything, Everything is everything, But you’re missing” (lines 3-5. ) Just in these three lines the reader can hear the emptiness inside Springsteen’s voice. His telling us that he knows everything is right where it needs to be but not that one other.

When reading between the lines it is almost like the writer is lost without this other person. For example, as kids we would go to the store with our parents however we don’t always stay by their side while shopping and after wondering off we realize that we’re lost and the feeling of loneness begins to sink in.

Without our parents there next to us in the store we don’t know what to do with ourselves or where to go. As we keep reading on the reader begins to notice how the author is repeating a few words over and over again. Everything is everything, Everything is everything” (lines 8-9. ) Springsteen continuously repeats these words and each time he says them we can hear the anger, depression, and pain. He’s mad at the person who left him alone because now he’s lost and not sure what to do with himself. He’s depression is from being alone and not understanding completely why he was left alone. It’s almost as if this person abandoned him. The pain comes from all the other feelings put together.

Let’s face it when we’re faced with the feeling of loneness, emptiness, anger, and depression we can’t help but feel that pain and hurt with them. For most humans it can be hard to get over someone leaving us, which is why it seems as if the writer has not and does not want to get over this person leaving them alone. Towards the very end of the poem there is a little bit of change is words when he begins to talk about god and the devil. “Gods drifting in heaven, devil’s in the mailbox” (line 26. When the writer says that god is drifting in heaven it’s kind of like his way of saying that there is hope in the world. Almost as if he is not really all alone. The fact that Springsteen says the devil is in the mailbox it’s like the devil is there to deliver some bad news or collect death. Maybe the death of the relationship is what he came to collect or, it might be that it feels as if the devil is lingering so closely because of all these horrible feelings he feels.

The devil represents a dark symbol and although Springsteen does mention god in his poem it is brief and he mentions the devil right after. This is another way to show how he is feeling about the situation he is currently in. As one of the readers of “You’re Missing” just about all of us can relate to what the author is trying to relay in the poem. We have either experienced the loss of someone important to us or at least felt most if not all of these feelings he is.

This poem wasn’t written in order for us to learn something from it, but just to talk about what happened to Springsteen and the feelings that came with this sort of pain and anguish. It does not say whether or not Springsteen ever got over who ever left him all alone and it’s almost as if he didn’t want us to know. As if he wanted us to give the poem our own ending for some sort of happiness within the poem.