Home ⇒ 📌Sharon Olds ⇒ The Mortal One
The Mortal One
Three months after he lies dead, that
Long yellow narrow body,
Not like Christ but like one of his saints,
The naked ones in the paintings whose bodies are
Done in gilt, all knees and raw ribs,
The ones who died of nettles, bile, the
One who died roasted over a slow fire-
Three months later I take the pot of
Tulip bulbs out of the closet
And set it on the table and take off the foil hood.
The shoots stand up like young green pencils,
And there in the room is the comfortable smell of rot,
The bulb that did not make it, marked with
Ridges like an elephant’s notched foot,
I walk down the hall as if I were moving through the
Long stem of the tulip toward the closed sheath.
In the kitchen I throw a palmful of peppercorns into the
saucepan
As if I would grow a black tree from the soup,
I throw out the rotten chicken part,
Glad again that we burned my father
Before
Grow up
Out of him,
Maybe it had begun in his bowels but we burned his
bowels
The way you burn the long blue
Scarf of the dead, and all their clothing,
Cleansing with fire. How fast time goes
Now that I’m happy, now that I know how to
Think of his dead body every day
Without shock, almost without grief,
To take it into each part of the day the
Way a loom parts the vertical threads,
Half to the left half to the right like the Red Sea and you
Throw the shuttle through with the warp-thread
Attached to the feet, that small gold figure of my father-
How often I saw him in paintings and did not know him,
The tiny naked dead one in the corner,
The mortal one.
(2 votes, average: 3.00 out of 5)Related poetry:
- The Tenants Of The Little Box Throw into the little box A stone You’ll take out a bird Throw in your shadow You’ll take out the shirt of happiness Throw in your father’s root You’ll take out the axle of the universe The little box works for you Throw into the little box A mouse You’ll take out a quaking hill […]...
- Milano wandering around milan my father I know that (bred in the bone) i’m you I walk and think – my legs roll onwards I take in the atmosphere but not the view But now you’re dead – and i’ve been silent For the past five months since you were burned A numbness that called itself […]...
- Burning the Doll I am the girl who burned her doll, Who gave her father the doll to burn ” The bride doll I had been given At six, as a Christmas gift, By the same great uncle who once introduced me At my blind second cousin’s wedding To a man who winced, A future Miss America, I’m […]...
- To What Serves Mortal Beauty? To what serves mortal beauty ‘-dangerous; does set danc- Ing blood-the O-seal-that-so ‘ feature, flung prouder form Than Purcell tune lets tread to? ‘ See: it does this: keeps warm Men’s wits to the things that are; ‘ what good means-where a glance Master more may than gaze, ‘ gaze out of countenance. Those lovely […]...
- Losses It was not dying: everybody died. It was not dying: we had died before In the routine crashes and our fields Called up the papers, wrote home to our folks, And the rates rose, all because of us. We died on the wrong page of the almanac, Scattered on mountains fifty miles away; Diving on […]...
- When Klopstock England Defied When Klopstock England defied, Uprose William Blake in his pride; For old Nobodaddy aloft . . . and belch’d and cough’d; Then swore a great oath that made Heaven quake, And call’d aloud to English Blake. Blake was giving his body ease, At Lambeth beneath the poplar trees. From his seat then started he And […]...
- The Demon In Me The demon in me’s not dead, He’s living, and well. In the body as in a hold, In the self as in a cell. The world is but walls. The exit’s the axe. (“All the world’s a stage,” The actor prates.) And that hobbling buffoon Is no joker; In the body as in glory, In […]...
- Hymn 123 The repenting prodigal. Luke 15:13,etc. Behold the wretch whose lust and wine Had wasted his estate, He begs a share among the swine, To taste the husks they eat! “I die with hunger here,” he cries, “I starve in foreign lands; My father’s house has large supplies And bounteous are his hands. “I’ll go, and […]...
- Were natural mortal lady Were natural mortal lady Who had so little time To pack her trunk and order The great exchange of clime How rapid, how momentous What exigencies were But nature will be ready And have an hour to spare. To make some trifle fairer That was too fair before Enchanting by remaining, And by departure more....
- Mortal Limit I saw the hawk ride updraft in the sunset over Wyoming. It rose from coniferous darkness, past gray jags Of mercilessness, past whiteness, into the gloaming Of dream-spectral light above the lazy purity of snow-snags. There west were the Tetons. Snow-peaks would soon be In dark profile to break constellations. Beyond what height Hangs now […]...
- Mortal Enemy Let another cross his way- She’s the one will do the weeping! Little need I fear he’ll stray Since I have his heart in keeping- Let another hail him dear- Little chance that he’ll forget me! Only need I curse and fear Her he loved before he met me....
- Blood Feud Once, when my husband was a child, there came To his father’s table, one who called him kin, In sunbleached corduroys paler than his skin. His look was grave and kind; he bore the name Of the dead singer of Senlac, and his smile. Shyly and courteously he smiled and spoke; “I’ve been in the […]...
- Sonnet 46: Mine eye and heart are at a mortal war Mine eye and heart are at a mortal war How to divide the conquest of thy sight; Mine eye my heart thy picture’s sight would bar, My heart mine eye the freedom of that right, My heart doth plead that thou in him dost lie- A closet never pierced with crystal eyes- But the defendant […]...
- All My Pretty Ones Father, this year’s jinx rides us apart Where you followed our mother to her cold slumber; A second shock boiling its stone to your heart, Leaving me here to shuffle and disencumber You from the residence you could not afford: A gold key, your half of a woolen mill, Twenty suits from Dunne’s, an English […]...
- The Dead Heart After I wrote this, a friend scrawled on this page, “Yes.” And I said, merely to myself, “I wish it could be for a Different seizure as with Molly Bloom and her ‘and Yes I said yes I will Yes.” It is not a turtle Hiding in its little green shell. It is not a […]...
- The Dissolution She’s dead; and all which die To their first elements resolve; And we were mutual elements to us, And made of one another. My body then doth hers involve, And those things whereof I consist hereby In me abundant grow, and burdenous, And nourish not, but smother. My fire of passion, sighs of air, Water […]...
- A Dream I dreamed that I ws dead and crossed the heavens, Heavens after heavens with burning feet and swift, And cried: “O God, where art Thou?” I left one On earth, whose burden I would pray Thee lift.” I was so dead I wondered at no thing, Not even that the angels slowly turned Their faces, […]...
- Psalm 41 v.1-8 L. M. Charity to the poor; or, Pity to the afflicted. Blest is the man whose bowels move, And melt with pity to the poor; Whose soul, by sympathizing love, Feels what his fellow saints endure. His heart contrives for their relief More good than his own hands can do; He, in the time […]...
- Consulting summer's clock Consulting summer’s clock, But half the hours remain. I ascertain it with a shock I shall not look again. The second half of joy Is shorter than the first. The truth I do not dare to know I muffle with a jest....
- Psalm IV Now I’ll record my secret vision, impossible sight of the face of God: It was no dream, I lay broad waking on a fabulous couch in Harlem Having masturbated for no love, and read half naked an open book of Blake on my lap Lo & behold! I was thoughtless and turned a page and […]...
- The Naked And The Nude For me, the naked and the nude (By lexicographers construed As synonyms that should express The same deficiency of dress Or shelter) stand as wide apart As love from lies, or truth from art. Lovers without reproach will gaze On bodies naked and ablaze; The Hippocratic eye will see In nakedness, anatomy; And naked shines […]...
- The Forsaken Holy Mother of God, Merciful Mary. Hear Me! I am very weary. I have come From a village miles away, all day I have been coming, and I ache For such Far roaming. I cannot walk as light as I used, and my Thoughts grow confused. I am heavier than I was. Mary Mother, you […]...
- Throw Roses THROW roses on the sea where the dead went down. The roses speak to the sea, And the sea to the dead. Throw roses, O lovers- Let the leaves wash on the salt in the sun....
- The Geranium When I put her out, once, by the garbage pail, She looked so limp and bedraggled, So foolish and trusting, like a sick poodle, Or a wizened aster in late September, I brought her back in again For a new routine Vitamins, water, and whatever Sustenance seemed sensible At the time: she’d lived So long […]...
- Pumpkins in our time For months on end the pumpkins lay at peace, Their parent vines had all but browned and died Although a stubborn tendril here and there had Tried to grow again – glyphosate soon ended That attempt at insurrection. There were ten Back then, though only nine survived, the unlucky One caught rot and slowly died, […]...
- The Hearth Eternal There dwelt a widow learned and devout, Behind our hamlet on the eastern hill. Three sons she had, who went to find the world. They promised to return, but wandered still. The cities used them well, they won their way, Rich gifts they sent, to still their mother’s sighs. Worn out with honors, and apart […]...
- The Pact We played dolls in that house where Father staggered with the Thanksgiving knife, where Mother wept at noon into her one ounce of Cottage cheese, praying for the strength not to Kill herself. We kneeled over the Rubber bodies, gave them baths Carefully, scrubbed their little Orange hands, wrapped them up tight, Said goodnight, never […]...
- City Dead-House, The BY the City Dead-House, by the gate, As idly sauntering, wending my way from the clangor, I curious pause-for lo! an outcast form, a poor dead prostitute brought; Her corpse they deposit unclaim’d-it lies on the damp brick pavement; The divine woman, her body-I see the Body-I look on it alone, That house once full […]...
- Temporary Poem Of My Time Hebrew writing and Arabic writing go from east to west, Latin writing, from west to east. Languages are like cats: You must not stroke their hair the wrong way. The clouds come from the sea, the hot wind from the desert, The trees bend in the wind, And stones fly from all four winds, Into […]...
- The Ballad Of Father Gilligan The old priest Peter Gilligan Was weary night and day; For half his flock were in their beds, Or under green sods lay. Once, while he nodded on a chair, At the moth-hour of eve, Another poor man sent for him, And he began to grieve. ‘I have no rest, nor joy, nor peace, For […]...
- On the Trek Oh, the weary, weary journey on the trek, day after day, With sun above and silent veldt below; And our hearts keep turning homeward to the youngsters far away, And the homestead where the climbing roses grow. Shall we see the flats grow golden with the ripening of the grain? Shall we hear the parrots […]...
- Morning (Love Sonnet XXVII) Naked you are simple as one of your hands; Smooth, earthy, small, transparent, round. You’ve moon-lines, apple pathways Naked you are slender as a naked grain of wheat. Naked you are blue as a night in Cuba; You’ve vines and stars in your hair. Naked you are spacious and yellow As summer in a golden […]...
- A Western Ballad When I died, love, when I died My heart was broken in your care; I never suffered love so fair As now I suffer and abide When I died, love, when I died. When I died, love, when I died I wearied in an endless maze That men have walked for centuries, As endless as […]...
- SUMMER FEVER The unsettled trees seem to share My tensions of body and mind: Unable to move before the shell of the wind, Yielding as much as their nature allows, They will break if pushed too far, Splinter to show the white flesh of their wood And sweet transparencies of sap. If 1 am pushed too far […]...
- A Mysterious Naked Man A mysterious naked man has been reported On Cranston Avenue. The police are performing The usual ceremonies with coloured lights and sirens. Almost everyone is outdoors and strangers are conversing Excitedly As they do during disasters when their involvement is Peripheral. ‘What did he look like? ‘ the lieutenant is asking. ‘I don’t know, ‘ […]...
- S. I. W “I will to the King, And offer him consolation in his trouble, For that man there has set his teeth to die, And being one that hates obedience, Discipline, and orderliness of life, I cannot mourn him.” W. B. Yeats. Patting goodbye, doubtless they told the lad He’d always show the Hun a brave man’s […]...
- The Confessional [SPAIN.] I. It is a lie – their Priests, their Pope, Their Saints, their… all they fear or hope Are lies, and lies – there! through my door And ceiling, there! and walls and floor, There, lies, they lie – shall still be hurled Till spite of them I reach the world! II. You think […]...
- The Orphan My father and mother are dead, Nor friend, nor relation I know; And now the cold earth is their bed, And daisies will over them grow. I cast my eyes into the tomb, The sight made me bitterly cry; I said, “And is this the dark room, Where my father and mother must lie?” I […]...
- Sonnet XXII: Love, Banish'd Heav'n Love, banish’d Heav’n, on Earth was held in scorn, Wand’ring abroad in need and beggary, And wanting friends, though of a Goddess born, Yet crav’d the alms of such as passed by. I, like a man devout and charitable, Clothed the naked, lodg’d this wand’ring guest, With sighs and tears still furnishing his table With […]...
- The Alchemist I burned my life, that I may find A passion wholly of the mind, Thought divorced from eye and bone Ecstasy come to breath alone. I broke my life, to seek relief From the flawed light of love and grief. With mounting beat the utter fire Charred existence and desire. It died low, ceased its […]...