Inventions of Farewell A Collection of Elegies

by Gilbert, Sandra M.; Dickinson, Emily; Stevens, Wallace; Millay, Edna St Vincent; Olds, Sharon; Kunitz, Stanley; Merwin, W. S.

• ISBN13: 9780393049725
• ISBN10: 0393049728
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2001-04-17
• Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company

Summary

This collection of English language poems of mourning, from the late Middle Ages to the present, traces the trajectory of grief and illustrates how the deepest sorrow has produced poignant and resonant works of art. Includes poems by Emily Dickinson, Dylan Thomas, Edna St. Vincent Millay, Sharon Olds, and others.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments	21	(23)
Introduction	23	(10)
I. WATCHING: VISIONS OF THE DYING AND THE DEAD
``Do Not Go Gentle'': Watching the Dying	33	(42)
Lord Randall Anon	36	(1)
The Death-Bed	37	(1)
Thomas Hood
``Twas Crisis--All the length had passed--(#1093)	38	(1)
Emily Dickinson
Danny Deever	39	(2)
Rudyard Kipling
``Out, Out--''	41	(2)
Robert Frost
The Last Words of My English Grandmother	43	(2)
William Carlos Williams
Sorrow	45	(1)
D. H. Lawrence
Dulce Et Decorum Est	46	(1)
Wilfred Owen
Do Not Go Gentle into That Good Night	47	(1)
Dylan Thomas
Last Days	48	(5)
Donald Hall
Lament	53	(4)
Thom Gunn
As He Came Near Death	57	(1)
Roy Fisher
Death	58	(1)
John Stone
The Sacrifice	59	(2)
Frank Bidart
Thirteen Steps and the Thirteenth of March	61	(2)
Douglas Dunn
The Lifting	63	(2)
Sharon Olds
Terminal Resemblance	65	(2)
Louise Gluck
No Goodbyes	67	(2)
Paul Monette
New Dog (6), from Atlantis	69	(3)
Mark Doty
The Current (6), from The Work	72	(1)
Tom Sleigh
John Doe (V), from Ten Patients, and Another	73	(2)
Rafael Campo
``In the Chill of the Body'': Viewing the Dead	75	(24)
A Sight in Camp in the Daybreak Gray and Dim	78	(1)
Walt Whitman
'Twas warm--at first (#614)	79	(1)
Emily Dickinson
Beside the Bed	80	(1)
Charlotte Mew
Triad	81	(1)
Adelaide Crapsey
The Emperor of Ice-Cream	82	(1)
Wallace Stevens
Death	83	(2)
William Carlos Williams
The Bride	85	(1)
D. H. Lawrence
Gazing upon him now (XVII), from Sonnets from an Ungrafted Tree	86	(1)
Edna St. Vincent Millay
A Brown Girl Dead	87	(1)
Countee Cullen
Habit	88	(1)
Ruth Stone
Viewing the Body	89	(1)
W. D. Snodgrass
Edge	90	(1)
Sylvia Plath
Marked with D.	91	(1)
Tony Harrison
His Ashes	92	(2)
Sharon Olds
The Burial	94	(1)
Ellen Bryant Voigt
Wake	95	(1)
Tess Gallagher
The Fare	96	(1)
Molly Peacock
Ashes	97	(2)
Malena Morling
``How to Perform a Funeral'': Ceremonies of Separation	99	(22)
There's been a Death, in the Opposite House (#547)	102	(1)
Emily Dickinson
Tract	103	(3)
William Carlos Williams
On the Road to Woodlawn	106	(1)
Theodore Roethke
Of De Witt Williams on His Way to Lincoln Cemetery	107	(1)
Gwendolyn Brooks
Twelve Minutes	108	(2)
J. C. Hall
Minister	110	(1)
Anne Stevenson
On the Death of a Colleague	111	(2)
Stephen Dunn
The Eulogy	113	(2)
Carol Muske
Columbarium	115	(1)
Judi Benson
Paying Respects (3), from Blessings	116	(2)
Mary Stewart Hammond
Cremation	118	(1)
Agha Shahid Ali
Documentary	119	(1)
Joseph Stroud
Funeral	120	(1)
Carol Ann Duffy
``Death, Thou Shalt Die'': Imagining the Afterlife	121	(30)
Death, be not proud (X), from Holy Sonnets	125	(1)
John Donne
They Are All Gone into the World of Light!	126	(2)
Henry Vaughan
The Garden of Proserpine	128	(4)
Algernon Charles Swinburne
The Cold Heaven	132	(1)
William Butler Yeats
Sister Lou	133	(2)
Sterling A. Brown
The Rites for Cousin Vit	135	(1)
Gwendolyn Brooks
The Explosion	136	(1)
Philip Larkin
The Heaven of Animals	137	(2)
James Dickey
Somewhere in Africa	139	(2)
Anne Sexton
Death's Door	141	(2)
Thom Gunn
November 26, 1992: Thanksgiving at the Sea Ranch, Contemplating Metempsychosis	143	(2)
Sandra M. Gilbert
``Good Night, Willie Lee, I'll See You in the Morning''	145	(1)
Alice Walker
The Dead	146	(1)
Ellery Akers
Dust on the Mantel: Sonnet	147	(4)
Jacqueline Osherow
II. GRIEVING: LAMENTATIONS FOR THE DEAD
``Begin then, Sisters of the Sacred Well'': The Pastoral Tradition	151	(28)
Lycidas	154	(6)
John Milton
Adonais	160	(19)
Percy Bysshe Shelley
''Blood-Hot and Personal'': Mourning Deaths in the Family	179	(50)
C.L.M.	182	(2)
John Masefield
At My Father's Grave	184	(1)
Hugh MacDiarmid
Feel Me	185	(2)
May Swenson
The Marker Slants ... (384), from The Dream Songs	187	(1)
John Berryman
Sailing Home from Rapallo	188	(2)
Robert Lowell
Bedside	190	(1)
Diana O'Hehir
from The Olga Poems (I)	191	(1)
Denise Levertov
The Great Blue Heron	192	(2)
Carolyn Kizer
from Kaddish (I)	194	(5)
Allen Ginsberg
The Shortest Day	199	(1)
William Dickey
A Woman Mourned by Daughters	200	(1)
Adrienne Rich
Dad	201	(1)
Elaine Feinstein
Flood	202	(1)
Tony Harrison
from Clearances (Sonnets 2, 3, 7)	203	(2)
Seamus Heaney
Mi Mama, the Playgirl	205	(1)
Richard Garcia
Autumn 1980	206	(3)
Marilyn Hacker
Trying To	209	(2)
Wendy Barker
The Lost Pilot	211	(2)
James Tate
Arrangements	213	(3)
Alan Williamson
Gathering the Bones Together	216	(4)
Gregory Orr
from Songs for My Father	220	(2)
Yusef Komunyakaa
After father died (2), from Fathers in the Snow	222	(1)
Jill Bialosky
This Hour and What Is Dead	223	(2)
Li-Young Lee
Tricycles	225	(4)
Francisco Aragon
``How You Call to Me, Call to Me'': Lamenting the Death of the Beloved	229	(30)
Methought I Saw My Late Espoused Saint	232	(1)
John Milton
My Dearest Dust	233	(1)
Lady Catherine Dyer
She Dwelt Among the Untrodden Ways	234	(1)
William Wordsworth
A Slumber Did My Spirit Seal	235	(1)
William Wordsworth
R. Alcona to J. Brenzaida	236	(2)
Emily Bronte
The Going	238	(2)
Thomas Hardy
The Voice	240	(1)
Thomas Hardy
Winter	241	(1)
Ruth Stone
Curtains	242	(1)
Ruth Stone
``Rosina Alcona to Julius Brenzaida''	243	(2)
Judith Wright
Under the Roof of Memory	245	(2)
Peter Davison
Letter with No Address	247	(4)
Donald Hall
June 15, 1992: Widow's Walk, Harpswell, Maine	251	(2)
Sandra M. Gilbert
Dining	253	(2)
Douglas Dunn
Crazy Menu	255	(2)
Tess Gallagher
Half Life	257	(2)
Paul Monette
``Sorrow's Springs'': Grieving for the Deaths of Children	259	(18)
On My First Son	262	(1)
Ben Jonson
In Memory of My Dear Grandchild Anne Bradstreet...	263	(1)
Anne Bradstreet
On the Death of My First and Dearest Child, Hector Philips...	264	(1)
Katherine Philips
Why did baby die...?	265	(1)
Christina Rossetti
Maternity	266	(1)
Alice Meynell
First Death in Nova Scotia	267	(2)
Elizabeth Bishop
For a Lost Child	269	(1)
William Stafford
Little Elegy	270	(1)
X. J. Kennedy
the lost baby poem	271	(1)
Lucille Clifton
I Decide Not to Have Children	272	(2)
Marilyn Nelson
Child Burial	274	(3)
Paula Meehan
``How Far from then Forethought of'': Mourning the Deaths of Friends	277	(24)
Sonnet on the Death of Richard West	280	(1)
Thomas Gray
from In Memoriam (7, 8, 67)	281	(2)
Alfred
Lord Tennyson
My Friend	283	(1)
Christina Rossetti
Felix Randal	284	(1)
Gerard Manley Hopkins
With Rue My Heart Is Laden	285	(1)
A. E. Housman
Elegy (V), from Memorial to D.C.	286	(2)
Edna St. Vincent Millay
Elegy for Jane	288	(1)
Theodore Roethke
Long, Disconsolate Lines	289	(1)
Jane Cooper
For John Chappell	290	(1)
Gary Snyder
Sea Canes	291	(1)
Derek Walcott
Death's Blue-Eyed Girl	292	(1)
Linda Pastan
Impossible to Tell	293	(7)
Robert Pinsky
Or Else	300	(1)
Heather McHugh
``The Stained Stones'': Elegizing Those Dead by Violence	301	(36)
Ode Written in the Beginning of the Year 1746	305	(1)
William Collins
Mother and Poet	306	(5)
Elizabeth Barrett Browning
The Portent	311	(1)
Herman Melville
Parentage	312	(1)
Alice Meynell
from Epitaphs of the War	313	(1)
Rudyard Kipling
Unknown Soldiers	314	(1)
Edgar Lee Masters
from Hugh Selwyn Mauberley (IV, V)	315	(2)
Ezra Pound
The General	317	(1)
Siegfried Sasson
To His Love	318	(1)
Ivor Gurney
The Lynching	319	(1)
Claude McKay
Anthem for Doomed Youth	320	(1)
Wilfred Owen
Song for a Dark Girl	321	(1)
Langston Hughes
The Fury of Aerial Bombardment	322	(1)
Richard Eberhart
Mourning Poem for the Queen of Sunday	323	(2)
Robert Hayden
The Death of the Ball Turret Gunner	325	(1)
Randall Jarrell
The Six Million	326	(2)
Naomi Replansky
After	328	(1)
Shirley Kaufman
Driving through Minnesota during the Hanoi Bombings	329	(1)
Robert Bly
For the Record	330	(2)
Audre Lorde
Blue	332	(1)
William Heyen
Facing It	333	(1)
Yusef Komunyakaa
Tiananmen	334	(3)
James Fenton
``Brightness Falls from the Air'': Grieving for the Great and Beautiful	337	(24)
When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom'd	340	(9)
Walt Whitman
To an Athlete Dying Young	349	(2)
A. E. Housman
For a Dead Lady	351	(1)
Edwin Arlington Robinson
Buffalo Bill's Lament (VIII), from Portraits	352	(1)
E. E. Cummings
The Day Lady Died	353	(1)
Frank O'Hara
malcolm	354	(1)
Lucille Clifton
Poem for Dizzy	355	(2)
Betty Adcock
Elegy for Elvis	357	(2)
Richard Blessing
The Death of Marilyn Monroe	359	(1)
Sharon Olds
Sonnet in Primary Colors	360	(1)
Rita Dove
``Laments for the Makers'': Poets Mourning Other Poets	361	(40)
Lament for the Makaris	364	(4)
William Dunbar
To the Memory of My Beloved, The Author, Mr. William Shakespeare...	368	(3)
Ben Jonson
London, 1802	371	(1)
William Wordsworth
Her--``last Poems'' -- (#600)	372	(1)
Emily Dickinson
At Melville's Tomb	373	(1)
Hart Crane
North Haven	374	(2)
Elizabeth Bishop
Paul Laurence Dunbar	376	(1)
Robert Hayden
I have moved to Dublin...(312), from The Dream Songs	377	(1)
John Berryman
How It Is	378	(1)
Maxine Kumin
Lament for the Makers	379	(8)
W. S. Merwin
Sylvia's Death	387	(3)
Anne Sexton
The Death of John Berryman	390	(1)
William Dickey
For Lew Welch in a Snowfall	391	(1)
Gary Snyder
For the Poets (Christopher Okigbo & Henry Dumas)	392	(3)
Jayne Cortez
Ballad of Ladies Lost and Found	395	(4)
Marilyn Hacker
And, Yes, Those Spiritual Matters	399	(2)
Christopher Gilbert
``If I Should Die, Think Only This of Me'': Self-Elegies	401	(22)
Tichborne's Elegy	404	(1)
Chidiock Tichborne
No longer mourn for me when I am dead (Sonnet LXXI)	405	(1)
William Shakespeare
Song	406	(1)
Thomas Flatman
My Own Epitaph	407	(1)
John Gay
Crossing the Bar	408	(1)
Alfred
Lord Tennyson
Prospice	409	(1)
Robert Browning
This Consciousness that is aware (#817)	410	(1)
Emily Dickinson
Remember	411	(1)
Christina Rossetti
To the Oaks of Glencree	412	(1)
J. M. Synge
A Death Song	413	(1)
Paul Laurence Dunbar
The Soldier	414	(1)
Rupert Brooke
Burial	415	(1)
Edna St. Vincent Millay
The Cottage Hospital	416	(2)
John Betjeman
A Funeral Oration	418	(1)
David Wright
A Dream of Burial	419	(1)
James Wright
After My Death	420	(1)
David Young
Fragment	421	(1)
C. K. Williams
Tropical Death	422	(1)
Grace Nichols
``Death & Co.'': Meditations on Mortality	423	(22)
A Litany in Time of Plague	426	(2)
Thomas Nashe
Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard	428	(5)
Thomas Gray
During Wind and Rain	433	(1)
Thomas Hardy
Spring and Fall	434	(1)
Gerard Manley Hopkins
The Ghost	435	(1)
Walter de la Mare
Grass	436	(1)
Carl Sandburg
Poem by the Bridge at Ten-Shin	437	(2)
Ezra Pound
Dirge Without Music	439	(1)
Edna St. Vincent Millay
Not Waving but Drowning	440	(1)
Stevie Smith
The Groundhog	441	(2)
Richard Eberhart
The Pardon	443	(1)
Richard Wilbur
Someone	444	(1)
Dennis O'Driscoll
Contributors Notes	445	(16)
Permissions Acknowledgments	461	(10)
Index	471