Robert Lowell, American poet, died on this day in 1977. He had been born into a family belonging to high society in Boston, but he had a difficult life. Alcoholic, was hospitalized several times in mental institutions throughout his life, and among his disciples he had Silvia Plath y --Anne Sexton. We remember it with this selection of poems.
Robert Lowell — Selection of Poems
The two walls
A white wall faces a black wall
somewhere, and they wake each other up.
Each burns in the radiance taken from the other.
The walls, now awake, must continue speaking,
Their colors seem similar, two shades of white,
each living in the shadow of the other.
How subtle these distinctions are when we can no longer choose.
In the face of such an avenger Don Juan he must have unsheathed his sword.
Two white stone walls that contract;
his search for bliss and his coincidence…
At this point in civilization, this point in the world,
the only satisfactory company imaginable is death.
This morning, a lump in my throat, I lie here,
painfully breathing the soul
New York.
The good life
The trees bloom, and the leaves pearl with mist
Over us they fan themselves in the wine glass of the elms,
wife, children and house: the core and useless adornment of life;
helpful, decomposition burns…
and not for the medals licking asses in the peacock meadow,
throwing birdseed at the bloody fighting cock,
or vomiting purple in the slave arena—
in Titus's Rome, tedious, martyred and eager to please.
The eagle is surrounded by new legions and old beliefs.
Perhaps the free man is surprised by imperial harassment
(rarely pleasant, a gallstone scourge)
that continues to drag those whom we would otherwise forget,
to the sleeping dog, to the hero hired for terror,
pearls for the necklace, rings on the ringing chain.
The nihilist as hero
«An inspired line is all that our poets deliver,
But what Frenchman has written six acceptable lines, one after the other?
Valery said. For Satan that was a happy day.
One longs for words hanging from the flesh of the living ox,
but the cold flame of the tinfoil licks the metallic log;
the unchanging beautiful fire of childhood
betrays monotonous visions.
Life is fueled by change and by definition,
In every season we get rid of wars, women and new cars
Sometimes, when sick or full of discomfort,
I watch the contracted flame of this match turn green,
The corn stalk acquires flowers and green extensions.
A nihilist must live the world as it is
looking at the impossible ascending to waste.
The holy innocents
Listen, the hay bells ring as
the road
of treaded wheels swings on the tar
and the ashen ice, under the hemp mill
and the tarpon channel. Drooling, the oxen stop
amazed at the defenses of a car,
and enormously they move along the hill of San Pedro.
Behold, those undefiled by woman, their pain is not
from this world:
King Herod shouts revenge next to the legs
of Jesus braided and stiff in the air.
A king of idiots and dumb children. Further
Herod that Herod this world; and the year,
the thousand nine hundred and forty-five of grace
not without fatigue and losses light the hill of slags
of our purification; the oxen approach
to the ruined foundation of his stable,
the holy manger where the bed is corn
and holly spread for Christmas. Yes like Jesus
Under the yoke they die, who will mourn them?
Shepherd's lamb, Child, how still you lie!
Like a tree by the water
Darkness summons darkness, and misfortune
is layered in the windows of this planned
Boston Babel where our money talks
and lavish darkness on a land
of preparation where the Virgin walks
and the roses surround her enamel face
or in splinters they fall onto parched streets.
Our Lady of Babylon, go ahead, go ahead,
I was once your favorite son,
Flies, flies on the tree, in the streets.
The flies, the flies, the flies of Babylon
hum in my eardrums while the demonic
funeral and long song of the people makes the hour explode
of floating cities where the masons of Babel
the golden tongue of the devil warns them
to build the city of tomorrow from here to the sun,
the one in Boston the infernal streets
it never shines; there the sunlight is a sword
that attacks the guardian of the Lord;
Flies, flies, on the tree, in the streets.
Flies over the miraculous waters of the Atlantic
ice cream, and Bernadette's eyes
They saw Our Lady standing in the grotto
of Massabielle, so clearly
that his vision blinded the eyes of reason. Tomb
lies open and devoured in Christ.
Oh walls of Jericho! and all the streets
that lead to our Atlantic wall sing:
"Sing,
Sing for the resurrection of the King!
The flies, the flies on the tree in the streets.