“To Write in this Red Muck of Things from my Heart”

 

IN THE DESERT
In the desert
I saw a creature, naked, bestial,
Who, squatting upon the ground,
Held his heart in his hands,
And ate of it.
I said, “Is it good friend?”
It is bitter—bitter,” he answered,
“But I like it
Because it is bitter,
And because it is my heart.”

MANY RED DEVILS
Many red devils ran from my heart
And out upon the page
They were so tiny
The pen could mash them.
And many struggled in the ink.
It was strange
To write in this red muck
Of things from my heart.

THERE WAS SET BEFORE ME A MIGHTY HILL
There was set before me a mighty hill,
And long days I climbed
Through regions of snow.
When I had before me the summit view,
It seemed that my labor
Had been to see gardens
Lying at impossible distances.

A MAN SAW A BALL OF GOLD
A man saw a ball of gold in the sky;
He climbed for it,
And eventually he achieved it —
It was clay.

Now this is the strange part:
When the man went to the earth
And looked again,
Lo, there was the ball of gold.
Now this is the strange part:
It was a ball of gold.
Aye, by the heavens, it was a ball of gold.

YOU SAY YOU ARE HOLY
You say you are holy,
And that
Because I have not seen you sin.
Ay, but there are those
Who see you sin, my friend.

–  Stephen Crane

 

I stumbled upon a section of Stephen Crane’s poetry in a tatty copy of “The Mentor Book of Major American Poets,” a book given as a gift to my mother upwards of thirty years ago. I would endlessly pore through the pages, marking my favorite ones. I don’t remember when exactly I got up to Stephen Crane (his section doesn’t start until page 224), but I do remember forgoing my usual method of marking specific poems and just sticking a bookmark at the first page of the section.

These do not feel like poems that were written behind a stately desk with sunlight streaming through the curtains, nor do they feel like poems written at a lonely bar or park bench with a raging storm overhead. They feel like sudden poems of unedited inebriation. They feel like tousled hair and restless nights at 2 am with bedclothes clinging in a cold sweat of clarity and confusion.

I tend to like poets like Walt Whitman, Wallace Stevens, and T.S. Eliot. They all share a certain beauty, an almost ethereal feel to their words that is pleasing to the ear and to the mind. Stephen Crane has none of these qualities. His poems are often brusque and jolting. I confess, I don’t like Crane’s novels much despite their popularity. But his poetry is some of my favorite. His poetry is a confession of the twistiness of the human mind and the darkness of the human soul. It does not try to be beautiful. And perhaps, that’s why I find it so.

Best,

Merav