Modern American Poetry

(^222) James E. Miller, Jr.
the riddle of a man and a woman
For what is there but love, that stares death
in the eye, love, begetting marriage
not infamy, not death
(P,p. 106)
The line turns almost Whitmanian in the midst of this new awareness:
Sing me a song to make death tolerable, a song
of a man and woman: the riddle of a man
and a woman.
What language could allay our thirsts,
what winds lift us, what floods bear us past defeats
but song but deathless song?
(P,p. l07)
Language, love, death: beauty is the key, beauty locked in the mind released,
beauty “transposed” to the simple scene of Beautiful Thing in all her vitality
and appeal:
Beautiful thing, your
vulgarity of beauty surpasses all their
perfections!
Vulgarity surpasses all perfections
—it leaps from a varnish pot and we see
it pass—in flames!
(P,pp. 119–20)
The books cannot substitute for the reality, however “vulgar”:
But you are the dream
of dead men
Beautiful Thing!
Let them explain you and you will be
the heart of the explanation. Nameless,
you will appear
Beautiful Thing
the flame’s lover—
(P,pp. 122–23)