Yeah I know what you mean, but that's also maybe what is cool about art in its many forms. If it is done properly, maybe it has multiple meanings and paths of communication to the person reading or consuming it. There is the literal meaning in this poem about someone who is in a desert and who is lonely and haunted by fears (I am just simplifying here it is much deeper and multi-faceted than that) and perhaps the reader will only get that out of it and/or something else, like a deeper feeling or emotion or something.

The words or instrument or brush or pencil are just a medium that I use to express myself. I am not an electric bass player, I am an artist. I simply choose to express myself, and my creativity, through that particular instrument.

JD Salinger when he wrote The Catcher In The Rye was fighting in the 11 months days following D-Day, which were apparently one of, if not the most deadly and dangerous times of WW II. Here's a small excerpt from a Vanity Fair article:

"Tuesday, June 6, 1944, was the turning point of J. D. Salinger’s life. It is difficult to overstate the impact of D-day and the 11 months of combat that followed. The war, its horrors and lessons, would brand itself upon every aspect of Salinger’s personality and reverberate through his work."

Some critics I believe say he channeled his emotions - anxiety, depression, anger, in the main character Holden Caulfield. And that is why the book is so powerful and has attained a cult following - not only the book but also the author obviously.

I watched the film biography of Salinger and there are these people who tried to meet him because they thought he would somehow be able to relate to them and they had some kind of special bond with him. But in a certain sense the book is just about some confused some would say, mentally ill teenager who talks about a particular period of his life.