On the Frontier of Writing

A soldier stands ready to defend, execute, ready to take on interrogation because they know the world is watching their every move. Seamus Heaney compares writing to fighting a war. The vivid images of combat and the procedures of war help demonstrate the seriousness of an author's writing process. A writer struggles to experience self satisfaction through their work while still working to please readers and publishers who somewhat control the success of a writer's career.
In the beginning of the poem, the speaker is describing being stopped while other troops inspect the make and number of his vehicle. The outside world is dissecting this writers work. They are trying to identify the writer through his work. One person leans close to he window in an attempt to see what this person is about. A window is transparent and through writing an author becomes somewhat transparent, expressing what's on the inside as in what's in the car through literature.
The speaker describes a situation where he is interrogated. People are usually interrogated by a superior like someone who has the power to determine something about their future. In an interrogation, the person being interrogated usually conforms to whatever the interrogators wants. For the writer the interrogator is the publisher and critics who edit and changes writers' work. The speaker explains how after the interrogation he feels empty as if the meaning and personal connection with his work has been stripped bare from his writing. However, at the end of the poem, the speaker explains how he has emerged from behind the waterfall. A waterfall shows an image but not clearly through the water. This image shows the writer eing able to put himself into his work clearly for all to see without is being clouded by the water of society. His work is not diluted. If he perseveres on the frontier and struggles through the difficult process of writing in the end he can stand strong behind his work.