The Unswept, by Sharon Olds, from New Michigan Press

My example of a broadside is a poem, called “The Unswept”, by Sharon Olds. It puts the poem itself in the center of the page, but then uses a decorative border, along with a design in the space in between the poem and the border.

Total immersion occurs in this piece because the inside pattern occurs in the same place as the title and author of the poem. When my eye looks at this broadside, I start at the title, in the upper right hand corner. I then follow the design around the piece clockwise, and end at the author’s name, and then onto the poem. The design on the inside almost seems to create a path for my eyes to follow.

In terms of the design itself, I think it abstractly represents the poem. The piece has very natural imagery, such as crabs, mussels, skeletons, laid down in tiles- and the both the border and the interior design seem to support that. The circles on the inside and the triangles on the outside could be seen as shells, and the hatching, as well as the triangles, could represent the tiling.