I am sitting here in Massachusetts, in my sister's old bedroom, digesting several quarts of coffee and thinking about Dickens. A garbage truck is growling in the distance; downstairs my mother is chattering with my older son. My younger son is still asleep, recovering from last night's onslaught of thrilling Olympic television. I have no idea what we will be doing today, except that it's liable to involve money and stores since there is not a lot do around here that involves anything else.
So I will open my collected Hayden Carruth at random and see what he has to say about the matter. And here is the line:
"So many poems about the deaths of animals."
Amazing, isn't it, how well this "find a random line" approach works?--that is, if one believes that poetry should be responsible for making us wince. Which I do.
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ReplyDeleteThe Carruth line sparked my mind to recall this Wallace Stevens poem -- my absolute favorite of his. I love the final line.
ReplyDeletePoetry Is A Destructive Force
That's what misery is,
Nothing to have at heart.
It is to have or nothing.
It is a thing to have,
A lion, an ox in his breast,
To feel it breathing there.
Corazon, stout dog,
Young ox, bow-legged bear,
He tastes its blood, not spit.
He is like a man
In the body of a violent beast
Its muscles are his own...
The lion sleeps in the sun.
Its nose is on its paws.
It can kill a man.
Also, the deaths of animals, particularly domestic animals, can be such a private sorrow.
ReplyDeleteI think of your goat in Tracing Paradise.
ReplyDeleteYou are in MA! Come see me.
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