"Poetry Final"

I think that to properly address this first question, one must have had significant experience with both types of relationships: Love and Lust. Now, while I've had my fair share of brief affairs, my encounters with true love have been few and far between. My idea of "the real McCoy" is a composite of fairy tales and Humphrey Bogart movies. This said, I'm sure you'll understand the sickening idealism that follows.

I have chosen to compare and contrast three "love" poems with three "lust" poems from our text, An Introduction to Poetry (9th edition, Kennedy and Gioia, Longman Publishing). I feel that poems about true love often incorporate themes of duration, unity and longevity; all lasting sentiments. Conversely, poems of a lusty nature convey the sentiment that the feeling is transitory, and must be pounced on immediately (before we get a chance to think about it too much).

Love poems talk about the spiritual aspects of the subject and needing to be vulnerable to them. Lust poems seem to focus more on the physical beauty of the subject, recalling the flush of a cheek and the immediacy, the urgency of their passion. Rarely is the need to share and communicate with the subject conveyed.

"Most Like an Arch This Marriage," by John Ciardi (Page 259) illustrates the lasting nature of true love by using the image of two pillars which, on their own, are "roofless around nothing" (Line 11). The words "Till we kiss I am no more than upright and unset," convey the strength and durability the speaker finds with this significant other. The image of the stones used to create this arch communicate that idea of permanence. This speaker knows that real love comes through work and compromise, and is not a quick fix. Vulnerability on both parts is also a necessity, because "It is by falling in and in we make the all-bearing point, for one another's sake, in faultless failing, raised by our own weight" (13). Love and lovers are imperfect, but exquisite in those imperfections.

Cummings' "somewhere i have never travelled, gladly beyond" (Page 402) creates a similar though slightly more romanticized image of true love. The importance of being accessible is illustrated by using the metaphor of the opening and closing flower. "Though I have closed myself like fingers, you open always petal by petal myself and Spring opens…her first rose" (Line 5-7). While a flower is certainly a less durable and hearty symbol than a stone archway, the quality of love represented by it is no less valid. Cummings' other-worldly description of this subject is haunting. "Nothing which we are to perceive in this world equals the power of your intense fragility" (13-14). This love is surreal, cosmic, "rendering death and forever with each breathing" (16).

But the best example of a "love" poem among these offering is Yeats' "When You Are Old" (Page 513). There isn't any greater testament to love than endurance. "When you are old and grey and full of sleep…take down this book…and dream of the soft look your eyes had once" (Lines 1-4). This is a devotion that will last for years to come, unchanged by time or circumstance. There were many who "loved your beauty with love false or true, but one man loved the pilgrim soul in you" (5-7). His cherished memories of that love have nothing to do with her "changing face," but are rooted deeply in his affection for her spirit, that unseen beauty that lays within.

In "Imperial Adam" (Page 281), Hope insinuates that lust and sex are man's downfall and the door through which all evil enters. The speaker's images of Eve's "sinuous thighs," "dumb breasts," and the "great pod of her belly" when she was with child all create a detestable picture of that temptress (Lines 20, 39, 40). She is "sly as the snake" (20). Her lust is the cause of all man's woes, the reason he was barred from Eden. In addition, she bred that inconstant and cruel race with "the first murderer," who "lay upon the earth" (44), Cain.

"To the Virgins, to Make Much of Time" (Page 431) puts forward a slightly less damning representation of lust. Herrick actually seems to encourage that impulsive behavior, urging those fresh young maids to "Gather ye rosebuds while ye may" (Line 1). The whole poem is basically a call to action written by (of course) one who wishes to disband that virtue and innocence. It seems to me that a woman's goal from the beginning of time has been to preserve her chastity and virtue, and man's role has been to convince her otherwise. The speaker persuasively rationalizes his motives, saying "having once but once your prime, you may forever tarry" (15-16). Now, he could probably give 1,000 good reasons: "Old Time is still a-flying," "That age is best which is the first," "Be not coy, but use your time" are just a few of those. However, it is clear that there is only one motivating force for the speaker of this poem-- the one that exists "when youth and blood are warmer" (10).

In "To His Coy Mistress" (Page 451) Andrew Marvel voices same sentiments as Herrick, but in a slightly more romantic context. He begins: "had we but world enough and time, this coyness, lady, were no crime" (Line 1)…but since we're in a rush, let's hurry up and get this over with. That may be a sarcastic way of putting it-but, in all seriousness, the message is there. "Time's winged chariot hurrying near" (22) is throwing the speaker into a tizzy, considering that place where "thy beauty shall no more be found" (25). And maybe these men are right (that's just what they'd like me to think!). What good does it do a woman to bite, scratch and repress her urges, only to end up where "worms shall try that long preserved virginity" (28)? Seize the day, "while thy willing soul transpires at every pore with instant fires" (35-36).

I suppose we're not really trying to make a judgment, though…just a distinction. The bottom line is that lust and passion may be very compelling forces, but they are as temporary and changeable as the beauty that inspires them. Compared to the reliable, transcendental, and lasting character of "true" love, it is obvious that the two must be approached very differently, for their natures are hardly similar at all.

In respect to the second topic, I'd like to begin with that adage that "Nothing is certain but death and taxes." These poems reinforce the idea that, while man cannot count on the weather, his automobile, his god, or even his human companions (especially not his human companions), one thing is certain: his time here is limited. These writers also seem to feel that death is nondiscriminatory-would take the life of a villain just as soon as that of a child's-and that God is an unsympathetic bystander. Some of the poets have a slightly more accepting view as to the nature of death, and wish us to understand that it is a part of the life cycle. I always had a problem with the phrase "Death is a part of life." Not that it's untrue. It just bothers me, aesthetically speaking.

In Housman's "With rue my heart is laden" (Page 177), there is an ease and general comfort with the idea of death. While the speaker's heart is woeful for having lost the "golden friends" (Line 2) it had, serenity prevails. The poem tells us: youth is fleeting, life is a temporary state, and death comes to us all, no matter how "rose-lipt," and "lightfoot"-ed we were in our invincible prime (2,4). Those once-immortal youths now reside "by brooks too broad for leaping"(5) and "in fields where roses fade"(9). We cannot traverse the "brook" that is our mortality, our human condition…and the beauty, that rose in the cheek, is no longer valid six feet underground. Both images include our return to the earth, a very humble resting place for creatures so grand and noble.

The poem "Merlin" (Page 83) focuses on the cyclical nature of our lives as well. Once we have passed on, we are merely "the husks of what was rich seed"(Line 2). Writing that "Arthur, Elaine, Mordred…are all gone"(5), Hill really reinforces that idea of death not differentiating between the royal or poor, good or evil, cruel or kind. No matter how legendary these figures were in life, they are all now "among the raftered galleries of bone"(6), and "made one"(7) beneath the earth over which "stands the pinnacled corn"(8). It reminds me of the passage in Hamlet explaining how a king may pass through the guts of a beggar.

"Out, out--"(Page 10) by Robert Frost gives a good account of a situation in which death seems to have a very sadistic nature. This boy, a mere nothing, is cut down before he's even had a fair shake at life. "Doing a man's work, though a child at heart"(Line 24), he meets his gruesome end. Unlike the previous poem, this one incorporates man's own insensitivity towards the death around him. Unless we're directly affected, it seems we take little or no notice of the fate that comes to those around us. Of those near the boy, the poem says "they, since they were not the one dead, turned to their affairs"(35). This also points out the fact that simply existing is pure drudgery for a great deal of people…that is to say, you work and work and then you die (also found in more colorful form with that classic "Life's a ***** and then you die"). People pass. Life goes on without them. This can be a painful notion if you're the one who's lost someone close to you, but still happens to be the ugly truth.

But if you see this enough…enough senseless death, and tragedy…you begin to question the forces behind them which, for many, is god. The death of a child seems impossible to justify. Abuse, starvation, and accidents all seem like undeserved punishments sent down by a cruel, unmerciful ruler. We struggle to find an answer to the question "What did we do to deserve this?" All these frustrations are beautifully expressed in the poem "The Gold Lily" by Louise Gluck (Page 26). The poet calls on god, confronting him. In lines 9-12 she writes, "My companions are failing, thinking you do not see. How can they know you see unless you save us?" Death is out of our hands, orchestrated by a greater power. This greater power at times seems indifferent, "close enough to hear" his "child's terror"(15-16) but never seeming to do anything to alleviate the pain and suffering of his "children". The speaker asks a very good question, one that plagues the faith of many, and makes faith impossible for countless others: "Are you not my father, you who raised me?" Why would a caring and benevolent god allow for such suffering in his world?

That theme is further expanded on in "Dulce et Decorum Est", a powerful piece by Wilfred Owen. That unfortunate soldier who does not safeguard himself in time meets a gruesome fate; "the white eyes writhing in his face…the blood come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs" (Lines 19, 22). It is not a noble death. There are no gun salutes or waving banners. This man has died with little or no dignity, even after having sacrificed his very life for what was, to him, a noble cause. Death does not take heroism into account. It puts all those boys (cowards and heroes alike) into a heap…the same way the speaker describes "the wagon that we flung him in"(18). But that's the whole point of the poem-- to deflate the myth that "It is sweet and fitting to die for one's country". Still, it seems unjust that this kind of valor (misplaced as it might be) be met with such a grim end.

"The Fury of Aerial Bombardment" (Page 67) covers similar territory, detailing the horrible price of war, the senselessness of death due to it, and the roles that both god and man play in it. Unlike the piece by Owen, Eberhart places a fair share of the blame with man, saying that "he can kill as Cain could, but with multitudinous will"(Line 6-7). Obviously, we can't blame all of our problems on some unseen force. What Eberhart wants to know is not why god does it, but why god does not stop us from doing it to one another. "Is God by definition indifferent, beyond us all" (10)? How can we destroy one another with such ease? How can we care so little for our fellow man? "Of Van Wettering I speak, and Averill, names on a list, whose faces I do not recall but they are gone to early death" (13-15). And that's the end of the story.

These are only a few thoughts. Human beings are such children, as a species. What we don't know or understand is infinite…yet we consider ourselves such exceptional creatures. We have innumerable questions about death…and questions about life, god, human nature, and the universe beyond us. We've been asking them since the (choose one):

And we will likely ask them forever…or at least until we (choose one):

All I'm saying is that if I'm going to suffer eternal damnation because of it, I should at least get an "A" on the paper.