The Death of Allegory
I am wondering what became of all those tall abstractions
that used to pose, robed and statuesque, in paintings
and parade about on the pages of the Renaissance
displaying their capital letters like license plates.
Truth cantering on a powerful horse,
Chastity, eyes downcast, fluttering with veils.
Each one was marble come to life, a thought in a coat,
Courtesy bowing with one hand always extended,
Villainy sharpening an instrument behind a wall,
Reason with her crown and Constancy alert behind a helm.
They are all retired now, consigned to a Florida for tropes.
Justice is there standing by an open refrigerator.
Valor lies in bed listening to the rain.
Even Death has nothing to do but mend his cloak and hood,
and all their props are locked away in a warehouse,
hourglasses, globes, blindfolds and shackles.
Even if you called them back, there are no places left
for them to go, no Garden of Mirth or Bower of Bliss.
The Valley of Forgiveness is lined with condominiums
and chain saws are howling in the Forest of Despair.
Here on the table near the window is a vase of peonies
and next to it black binoculars and a money clip,
exactly the kind of thing we now prefer,
objects that sit quietly on a line in lower case,
themselves and nothing more, a wheelbarrow,
an empty mailbox, a razor blade resting in a glass ashtray.
As for the others, the great ideas on horseback
and the long-haired virtues in embroidered gowns,
it looks as though they have traveled down
that road you see on the final page of storybooks,
the one that winds up a green hillside and disappears
into an unseen valley where everyone must be fast asleep.
Fabulous! Fabulous! “a thought in a coat” the wonder of THEN versus lower-case now. The rush of time not taken anymore...”an empty mailbox”....the “razor blade resting in an empty ash tray” (this reminds me so much of DFW!).
ReplyDeleteThe “great ideas on horseback”....”asleep.....”.
If I had to define the most consistent emotions in my life it would be this poem- feeling so ALIVE & ENGAGED & then disconnected....almost as if on-Purpose?
I got this Billy Collins poetry book from one of my personal training clients in Boise 7 years ago as a going away to Hawaii present- I haven’t read it since that first year I was away- he is quite impressive.
https://owlcation.com/humanities/Analysis-of-Poem-The-Death-of-Allegory-by-Billy-Collins
ReplyDeleteThank you! Wonderful article. This makes me realize how emotional-drawn I am to intake most of the poems I read without a lot of background knowledge whatsoever. It urges me to slow down when I read and notice the literal art of poetry, the historical reference and the author's patterns.
DeleteI wrote another comment but it isn't here. Dang :(
DeleteI mentioned how today people are in love with Marvel, superheroes, anti-heroes, and the allegorical figures aren't needed. I also thought the poem was referring to controversy over statues of civil war heroes or slave owners, but I went to look at the date of the poem. That's where I found that article.
Allegories were very popular for a while in art, and now their time is over or different. Maybe today's allegorical symbols will survive and people 100s of years from now will miss them?
My mind is liking opposites tonight. So as Billy Collins writes so elegantly to the opposite of allegory in our modern day society...it makes me want to spend more time here. Our present-tense symbols, like your suggested super heroes and his "binoculars...money clip" that we tend to suround ourselves with allude to nothing more that that which they are. I took a look around my apartment and it was not until studying more about Eastern philosophy that my I took effort to change my surroundings...to include all of the elements within the home..to allude to the exact thing I was hoping to create within the mind. A clean, well-lit and intriguingly enhanced collection of Mystery...of Beauty! After reading this poem 3 times it has inspired me to collect it and remember it for all of the times when I forget to create this depth of BeAUTY!
DeleteI just read this poem again as it has appeared on page 27 of his "Sailing Alone Around the Room" collection as given to me by one of my personal training clients in Boise 2012 before I was going to leave for the Peace Corps (strange, isnʻt it....that this book would have traveled with me to the Africa I didnʻt go to- actually, where you were!). But, this poem gets me every time....leaves me as personified as the objects within it! Possibly one of my favorite Billy Collins poems so far!
ReplyDelete