Saturday at the Canal

“Saturday at the Canal” was published by Gary Soto in his 1991 collection of poems entitled Home Course in Religion. The poem is written in free verse and depicts two teenagers passing the time by a canal on a Saturday afternoon, while wishing they could be somewhere other than where they live. The poem appears to be largely autobiographical, as is the case with much of Soto’s poetry, and primarily deals with the feelings of isolation and loneliness that many teenagers experience in high school when one does not seem to fit in or be able to thrive. “Saturday at the Canal” also speaks more broadly to the limitless wildness and ambition of youth and the desperate desire of many teenagers on the brink of adulthood to experience the world beyond the limits of their hometown. Soto’s poem, like much of his poetry, engages with the energetic spirit of youth in tandem with the limitations he encountered himself growing up as the son of a working-class Mexican American family in the 1960s.

Poet Biography

Gary Soto was born on April 12, 1952 in Fresno, California to Mexican American parents. After his father died when Soto was only five years old, his family struggled to find work and often worked as migrant workers in the fields of the San Joaquin Valley. Soto was not encouraged to succeed at school but despite his mediocre grades, he developed an interest in poetry and literature. He went on to study at Fresno City College and California State University, Fresno, where he earned his BA in English in 1974 while studying with the poet Philip Levine. He later graduated from the University of California, Irvine, with an MFA in 1976.

His first collection of poetry, The Elements of San Joaquin, was published in 1977 and won the United States Award of the International Poetry Forum. Soto has written poetry for both adults and children and has also edited anthologies, engaged in filmmaking, and written several memoirs and a play. He has received numerous awards for literature and film, including the 1999 Hispanic Heritage Award for Literature, a Discovery/The Nation Prize, two California Library Association’s John and Patricia Awards, and fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts and the Guggenheim Foundation. His collection New and Selected Poems was a 1995 finalist for the National Book Award and the Los Angeles Times Award.

Soto has cited Gabriel García Márquez, Pablo Neruda, Edward Field, W.S. Merwin, Charles Simic, and James Wright as influences on his work, among others. He taught at the University of California, Berkeley and the University of California, Riverside, but retired to become a full-time writer. He currently lives in Berkeley, California.

Poem Text

Soto, Gary. “Saturday at the Canal.” Home Course in Religion, 1991. American Poems.

Summary

As the poem opens, an unnamed speaker remembers his life as a teenager in high school, beginning with the sharply matter-of-fact remark that he had hoped he would be happy by 17. Spoken from the perspective of someone reminiscing on those years, he recalls the pervasive feelings of obligation, annoyance, and restlessness as he depicts vignettes and snapshots of that time. He recalls roll calls and band music before big games. He remembers teachers who seemed too old to understand him and smelly hallways and classmates. To escape this, he passed time with a friend on Saturdays under the sun by the water, throwing rocks in the dust and lamenting that San Francisco was so far away. The two boys wanted to hitchhike to get there so they could be around people who can play guitar better than their classmates. He recalls that they did not drink or smoke, but that they had long hair which waved wildly in the wind and in their shadows that stretched across the dirt. He again considers ways to leave their town and reach San Francisco, whether by bus, car, or a long train that sways across a bridge. The poem culminates on a final reflection, as it seems to him that the years froze as they sat together on the canal bank. As the poem ends, the boys’ eyes follow the tumultuous water as it races out of town.