Because altruists are the least sexy people on earth, unable
to say “I want” without embarrassment,
we need to take from them everything they give,
then ask for more,
this is how to excite them, and because it’s exciting
to see them the least bit excited
once again we’ll be doing something for ourselves,
who have no problem taking pleasure,
always desirous and so pleased to be please, we who above all
can be trusted to keep the balance.
Stephen Dunn, from Different Hours
Look, it’s usually not a good idea
to think seriously about me.
I’ve been known to give others
a hard time. I’ve had wives and lovers—
trust that I know a little about trying
to remain whole while living
a divided life. I don’t easily open up.
If you come to me, come to me
so warned. I am smooth and grayish.
It’s possible my soul is made of schist.
But if you are not dissuaded by now,
well, my door is ajar. I don’t care
if you’re in collusion with the wind.
Come in, there’s nothing here
but solitude and me. I wouldn’t mind
being diminished one caress at a time.
-Stephen Dunn, from Here and Now
Because in large cities the famous truths
already had been plumbed and debated,
the metaphysicians of South Jersey lowered
their gaze, just tried to be themselves.
They’d gather at coffee shops in Vineland
and deserted shacks deep in the Pine Barrens.
Nothing they came up with mattered
so they were free to be eclectic, and as odd
as getting to the heart of things demanded.
They walked undisguised on the boardwalk.
At the Hamilton Mall they blended
with the bargain-hunters and the feckless.
Almost everything amazed them,
the last hour of a county fair,
blueberry fields covered with mist.
They sought the approximate weight of sadness,
its measure and coloration. But they liked
a good ball game too, well pitched, lots of zeros
on the scoreboard. At night when they lay down,
exhausted and enthralled, their spouses knew
it was too soon to ask any hard questions.
Come breakfast, as always, the metaphysicians
would begin to list the many small things
they’d observed and thought, unable to stop talking
about this place and what a world it was.
Stephen Dunn, from Different Hours
From her window marshland stretched for miles.
If not for egrets and gulls, it reminded her of the moors
behind the parsonage, how the fog often hovered
and descended as if sheltering some sweet compulsion
the age was not ready to see. On clear days the jagged
skyline of Atlantic City was visible—Atlantic City,
where all compulsions had a home.
“Everything’s too easy now,” she said to her neighbor,
“nothing resisted, nothing gained.” Once, at eighteen,
she dreamed of London’s proud salons glowing
with brilliant fires and dazzling chandeliers.
Already her own person—passionate, assertive—
soon she’d create a governess insistent on rights equal
to those above her rank. “The dangerous picture
of a natural heart,” one offended critic carped.
She’d failed, he said, to let religion reign
over the passions and, worse, she was a woman.
Now she was amazed at what women had,
doubly amazed at what they didn’t.
But she hadn’t come back to complain or haunt.
Her house on the bay was modest, adequate.
It need not accommodate brilliant sisters
or dissolute brothers, spirits lost or fallen.
Feminists would pay homage, praise her honesty
and courage. Rarely was she pleased. After all,
she was an artist; to speak of honesty in art,
she knew, was somewhat beside the point.
And she had married, had even learned to respect
the weakness in men, those qualities they called
their strengths. Whatever the struggle, she wanted men
included. Charlotte missed reading chapters to Emily,
Emily reading chapters to her. As ever, though, she’d try
to convert present into presence, something unsung
sung, some uprush of desire frankly acknowledged,
even in this, her new excuse for a body.
Stephen Dunn, from Local Visitations
It was never meant to be sensible,
fully understandable. The digger wasp,
for example, goes up to the tarantula
like a friend and the tarantula freezes,
allows itself to be inspected.
Then it digs the tarantula’s grave
while the tarantula watches. You, I bet,
would have guessed with a name
like tarantula, the tarantula would’ve been
the villain. But it is we who named
the tarantula and made the digger wasp
sound honest, hard-working.
And, of course, there is no villain,
only the scheme of things, only horror,
and occasionally the strange birth
of a butterfly and its short, gorgeous,
utterly careless season.
I should have mentioned the digger wasp
doesn’t kill its victim, but stuns it,
drags it to the grave, lays one egg
on its stomach, and closes up.
You see, the instinct is maternal.
The newborn wasp feeds
off the tarantula for weeks,
digs itself out at the right time
and enters the odd, wonderful world.
I’ve no advice for you, my friend.
You, who would take it—
as all of us would—and offer it
up to the heart, like a sacrifice.
Stephen Dunn, from Work and Love
You start with your own body
then move outward, but not too far.
Never try to please a city, for example.
Nor will the easy intimacy
in small towns ever satisfy that need
you have only whispered in the dark.
A woman is a beginning.
She need not be pretty, but must know
how to make her own ceilings
out of all that’s beautiful in her.
Together you must love to exchange
gifts in the night, and agree
on the superfluity of ribbons,
the fine violence of breaking out
of yourselves. No matter,
it’s doubtful she will be enough for you,
or you for her. You must have friends
of both sexes. When you get together
you must feel everyone has brought
his fierce privacy with him
and is ready to share it. Prepare
yourself though to keep something back;
there’s a center in you
you are simply a comedian
without. Beyond this, it’s advisable
to have a skill. Learn how to make something:
food, a shoe box, a good day.
Remember, finally, there are few pleasures
that aren’t as local as your fingertips.
Never go to Europe for a cathedral.
In large groups, create a corner
in the middle of the room.
Stephen Dunn, from Looking For Holes In The Ceiling
