Old Man Leaves Party

It was clear when I left the party
That though I was over eighty I still had
A beautiful body. The moon shone down as it will
On moments of deep introspection. The wind held its breath.
And look, somebody left a mirror leaning against a tree.
Making sure that I was alone, I took off my shirt.
The flowers of bear grass nodded their moonwashed heads.
I took off my pants and the magpies circled the redwoods.
Down in the valley the creaking river was flowing once more.
How strange that I should stand in the wilds alone with my body.
I know what you are thinking. I was like you once. But now
With so much before me, so many emerald trees, and
Weed-whitened fields, mountains and lakes, how could I not
Be only myself, this dream of flesh, from moment to moment?

Mark Strand
Blizzard of One




Old Man Leaves Party

Mark Strand


what it means

An eighty year old man leaves a party and goes out into the woods, where he finds a mirror. The he strips down and admires himself. Leaving a party can be stepping away from accolades and external glory. For some reason I presumed it was a party for him, the renowned poet. It can also mean dying, stepping away from the party of life. I see him in the limbo, taking stock in an honest, unpretentious way.

The line, "That though I was over eighty I still had a beautiful body" has so many possible tones: Is he boasting? Is he accepting his body at 80 and claiming it as beautiful? Is he being ironic and doesn't think he's beautiful at all? I'm hoping for the middle one because I want to love my body at all ages. As he takes off each piece of clothing, nature responds: the flowers nod, the creaking river flows once more. So, there seems to be gentle approval.

In the end he forces the younger to reader to face their own mortality "I was like you once" and not fear it.


why I like it

I actually wasn't sure I did like it. At first it seemed simplistic, not multi-layered enough to stand the test of time. Then I typed it in, and spending just that little extra time with it, made it richer and more powerful for me.

I like how it is both completely grounded--you know who is doing what--and creates a dreamlike floating mood.

I like what he does, strip in the wilderness both literally and figuratively. I like how he breaks the fourth wall and directly addresses the reader: "I know what you are thinking. I was like you once." I like how he weaves together body, mind, and spirit.


craft

Well, he does some things I've been taught not to do: multisyllabic words (introspection), anthropomorphizing objects (the wind held its breath). And some things I would never choose to do--capitalizing the first letter of each line--which, because it is how they used to do it a long time ago, makes the poem seem old-fashioned, slower paced, and more serious. Hmm, actually that makes it sound like a useful tool.

He does a beautiful job with the double vision of lines being both literal and metaphoric. Like this one: "How strange that I should stand in the wilds alone with my body." He's literally doing just that, but in a sense we are all standing in the wilds alone in our bodies. My mentor, Barbara, said you had to earn those lines, and you earn them from nailing the literal.

It's kind of a sonnet. It doesn't rhyme and it doesn't keep a steady iambic pentameter beat, but it is the requisite 14 lines, and even more importantly, it has a turn at the end. The last section directly addresses the reader "I know what you are thinking" and emerges from the introspection with a pronouncement: "How could I not/ Be only myself, this dream of flesh, from moment to moment?" I like how this poem is very big philosophically while contained in this form.