Literary Analysis
Below is an explication of Pullitzer Prize winning poet, Stephen Dunn's "Here and Now". At the bottom of the page, a progress report/peer review is available for download. This was submitted the 19th of September, 2012.
"here and now": Impressions of love
The main overarching tension in Stephen Dunn’s poem, “Here and Now,” is that of the writer’s rejection of his or her relationship with the Church for a more earthly relationship with a human being. This produces the dominant effect of hopefulness in finding meaning in life through love of others, as it demonstrates the writer’s abandonment of dogma, and its associated security blanket of heaven, and the writer’s confidence that they have suitably replaced that relationship with a human being.
The first stanza begins by employing an ironic paradox within the first three lines that sets up the tone and one of the major themes for the poem as a whole, the rejection of Catholicism. The first two lines denote that the writer’s transformation or struggle has taken place in the past by using the words “I’ve had to save myself from,” (2) rather than employing a present/future or imperfect tense “I have to” or “I was saving.” This completeness of the action may be part of what allows the writer to be able to make such an understatement about the rejection of Catholicism, because it is in the past and the writer has distanced himself or herself from it. The third line brings up the concepts of “My Lord and Blessed Mother” (3), which are oft thought of in contemporary American (Christian) culture as saviors, that is, My Lord being Jesus and Blessed Mother as the mother of Jesus. That these two savior figures are things that the writer says they have “had to save [themselves] from” (2) implies that the savior figures were in some way harming the writer. Thus the statement is ironic since saviors are usually thought of as saving, not harming, as well as a paradox due to the convoluted concept of saving oneself from a savior. By demonstrating this paradox, the writer has dismissed some of the core beliefs of Christian dogma without a scathing or belligerent tone; obviously My Lord and Blessed Mother cannot be savior figures if they are harmful. The tone is further solidified as non-belligerent while the writer goes on to call “My Lord and Blessed Mother” (3) “words I said and never meant” (4), and following with the concession “though I admit a part of me misses” (5), which can initially be taken to reflect back on “My Lord and Blessed Mother” (3) but then is demonstrated to reflect “the ornamental stateliness / of High Mass…” (6-7); that is, the writer concedes that the Church is indeed something to miss, while the connotation of “ornamental stateliness” (6) simultaneously dismisses the Church by implying that its “stateliness”, or grand appearance and manner, is merely “ornamental,” or decorative rather than of real importance (OED Online).
Instead of the pie in the sky that the Church promises, the writer discovers that Heaven is “reciprocal / and momentary, like lust / felt at exactly the same time,” (9-11). While “reciprocal” (9) is commonly defined as “given, done, or felt in return,” it is also a mathematical term that means being related to something so that their product is one, or they make a whole (“reciprocal,” OED Online); in this case it could imply that heaven creates a sense of oneness, or wholeness for the writer. That heaven is “momentary” however is ironic since heaven is often thought of as eternal (10). The simile goes on to finish the stanza, saying that heaven is like “two mortals… on a resilient bed, / making a small case for themselves,” (12-13). In total, the second stanza seems to suggest heaven is like the rush of sexual intercourse, fitting with the theme of it being a fleeting sense of wholeness, though it doesn’t go quite as far as saying they are the same, even though it does imply that the writer has experienced heaven, whatever it is, noting that it “exist[s]” (8) and they have “discovered” (9) it. Whatever heaven is, it is likely to do with human relationships, as the end of the metaphor smoothly pours into the next stanza.
“You and I became the words,” (14) stanza 3 begins, echoing “There are words /… / like My Lord and Blessed Mother” (1-3) from the first stanza. Combined with the previous two stanzas as well as line 15, an allusion to a children’s bedtime prayer, it becomes evident that the writer, at one point, began to pray for her or his relationship at night rather than “My Lord and Blessed Mother” (3), which are likely referring to the common Catholic prayers of Our Father and Hail Mary. This echoing demonstrates that the writer’s relationship with another human being, evidenced by the words “two mortals” (12), has taken the place of the writer’s relationship with the Church. Furthermore, as line 15 alludes to the short children’s lyrical prayer “Now I Lay Me Down to Sleep”, it again subtly dismisses the Church. This is made clear by the choice of the word “wake” in line 16 rather than using “awake” which would have provided an obvious internal rhyme with the word “again”). Since earlier versions of the prayer used the word “awake,” (Addison) it is referring to a specific version of the bedtime prayer that first appeared in the New England Primer (Fessendren, 39), a children’s textbook through which Puritans struggled to achieve pedagogical freedom from the Catholic Church (Wrede, 196) and “inoculated [their children] with anti-Catholicism,” (Fazzio, 47). The writer’s choice of alluding to a prayer popularized by the Puritans, who struggled to free themselves from Catholicism, may be symbolic of the writer’s own past struggle to free him or herself from the dogma of the Church, even though on paper it seems they have done so with grace.
While these metapoetic allusions to prayers pun on their rejection of the Church, the children’s bedtime prayer also suggests the infancy of the relationship at that time. Just as “You and I” (14) echoes “My Lord and Blessed Mother” (3) “…wishful / words, no belief in them yet” (16-17), echoes the lack of confidence expressed in “words I said and never meant” (4). This time, however, instead of the finality in the tone of “never meant” (3) the writer’s choice of the words “no belief in them yet” (17) suggests a hopeful tone and that he or she eventually does gain confidence in the relationship; that is to say, that the relationship is in some way better or more real than what the Church has to offer. The writer then likens the affection required to keep a relationship going to “a steady, low-voltage hum,” ending the stanza with an enjambment that allows the reader to draw out a steady humming sound as if it could go on forever. This drawing out of this sensory detail reinforces the sense of perpetuation of the writer’s affection and is interesting when juxtaposed with the alleged momentariness of heaven; it’s as if the writer’s unending affection has allowed them to experience moments of absolute perfection in and through their relationship. So the writer writes “For you and me / it’s here and now from here on in,” (32-33) demonstrating his or her dedication not only to the relationship and other earthly affairs—the “here and now” denoted in the title—but also his or her rejection of the Church and its promises of the eternal afterlife in its own version of heaven—that which is not here or now.
Works Cited
Addison, Joseph. “Self Titled.” The Spectator, 8 March, 1711: n/a. Available at http://www.gutenberg.org/files/12030/12030-h/SV1/Spectator1.html
Dunn, Stephen. "Here and Now." Here and Now: Poems. New York, NY: W. W. Norton &, 2011. Print.
Fazzio, Robert. The Origin, Proliferation, and Institutionalization of Anti-Catholicim in America, and its Impact on Modern Christian Apologetics. Auflage: GRIN Verlag, 2011. Print
Fessendren, Tracy. Culture and Redemption: Religion, the Secular, and American Literature. Princeton: Princeton Press, 2007. Print.
OED Online. Oxford Dictionaries Online. September 2012. Oxford University Press. 19 18 September 2012 http://oxforddictionaries.com
Wrede, Theda. “Book Review: The Story of A: The Alphabetization of America from The New England Primer to The Scarlet Letter.” South Atlantic Modern Language Association 67.1 (2002): 196. Print.
The first stanza begins by employing an ironic paradox within the first three lines that sets up the tone and one of the major themes for the poem as a whole, the rejection of Catholicism. The first two lines denote that the writer’s transformation or struggle has taken place in the past by using the words “I’ve had to save myself from,” (2) rather than employing a present/future or imperfect tense “I have to” or “I was saving.” This completeness of the action may be part of what allows the writer to be able to make such an understatement about the rejection of Catholicism, because it is in the past and the writer has distanced himself or herself from it. The third line brings up the concepts of “My Lord and Blessed Mother” (3), which are oft thought of in contemporary American (Christian) culture as saviors, that is, My Lord being Jesus and Blessed Mother as the mother of Jesus. That these two savior figures are things that the writer says they have “had to save [themselves] from” (2) implies that the savior figures were in some way harming the writer. Thus the statement is ironic since saviors are usually thought of as saving, not harming, as well as a paradox due to the convoluted concept of saving oneself from a savior. By demonstrating this paradox, the writer has dismissed some of the core beliefs of Christian dogma without a scathing or belligerent tone; obviously My Lord and Blessed Mother cannot be savior figures if they are harmful. The tone is further solidified as non-belligerent while the writer goes on to call “My Lord and Blessed Mother” (3) “words I said and never meant” (4), and following with the concession “though I admit a part of me misses” (5), which can initially be taken to reflect back on “My Lord and Blessed Mother” (3) but then is demonstrated to reflect “the ornamental stateliness / of High Mass…” (6-7); that is, the writer concedes that the Church is indeed something to miss, while the connotation of “ornamental stateliness” (6) simultaneously dismisses the Church by implying that its “stateliness”, or grand appearance and manner, is merely “ornamental,” or decorative rather than of real importance (OED Online).
Instead of the pie in the sky that the Church promises, the writer discovers that Heaven is “reciprocal / and momentary, like lust / felt at exactly the same time,” (9-11). While “reciprocal” (9) is commonly defined as “given, done, or felt in return,” it is also a mathematical term that means being related to something so that their product is one, or they make a whole (“reciprocal,” OED Online); in this case it could imply that heaven creates a sense of oneness, or wholeness for the writer. That heaven is “momentary” however is ironic since heaven is often thought of as eternal (10). The simile goes on to finish the stanza, saying that heaven is like “two mortals… on a resilient bed, / making a small case for themselves,” (12-13). In total, the second stanza seems to suggest heaven is like the rush of sexual intercourse, fitting with the theme of it being a fleeting sense of wholeness, though it doesn’t go quite as far as saying they are the same, even though it does imply that the writer has experienced heaven, whatever it is, noting that it “exist[s]” (8) and they have “discovered” (9) it. Whatever heaven is, it is likely to do with human relationships, as the end of the metaphor smoothly pours into the next stanza.
“You and I became the words,” (14) stanza 3 begins, echoing “There are words /… / like My Lord and Blessed Mother” (1-3) from the first stanza. Combined with the previous two stanzas as well as line 15, an allusion to a children’s bedtime prayer, it becomes evident that the writer, at one point, began to pray for her or his relationship at night rather than “My Lord and Blessed Mother” (3), which are likely referring to the common Catholic prayers of Our Father and Hail Mary. This echoing demonstrates that the writer’s relationship with another human being, evidenced by the words “two mortals” (12), has taken the place of the writer’s relationship with the Church. Furthermore, as line 15 alludes to the short children’s lyrical prayer “Now I Lay Me Down to Sleep”, it again subtly dismisses the Church. This is made clear by the choice of the word “wake” in line 16 rather than using “awake” which would have provided an obvious internal rhyme with the word “again”). Since earlier versions of the prayer used the word “awake,” (Addison) it is referring to a specific version of the bedtime prayer that first appeared in the New England Primer (Fessendren, 39), a children’s textbook through which Puritans struggled to achieve pedagogical freedom from the Catholic Church (Wrede, 196) and “inoculated [their children] with anti-Catholicism,” (Fazzio, 47). The writer’s choice of alluding to a prayer popularized by the Puritans, who struggled to free themselves from Catholicism, may be symbolic of the writer’s own past struggle to free him or herself from the dogma of the Church, even though on paper it seems they have done so with grace.
While these metapoetic allusions to prayers pun on their rejection of the Church, the children’s bedtime prayer also suggests the infancy of the relationship at that time. Just as “You and I” (14) echoes “My Lord and Blessed Mother” (3) “…wishful / words, no belief in them yet” (16-17), echoes the lack of confidence expressed in “words I said and never meant” (4). This time, however, instead of the finality in the tone of “never meant” (3) the writer’s choice of the words “no belief in them yet” (17) suggests a hopeful tone and that he or she eventually does gain confidence in the relationship; that is to say, that the relationship is in some way better or more real than what the Church has to offer. The writer then likens the affection required to keep a relationship going to “a steady, low-voltage hum,” ending the stanza with an enjambment that allows the reader to draw out a steady humming sound as if it could go on forever. This drawing out of this sensory detail reinforces the sense of perpetuation of the writer’s affection and is interesting when juxtaposed with the alleged momentariness of heaven; it’s as if the writer’s unending affection has allowed them to experience moments of absolute perfection in and through their relationship. So the writer writes “For you and me / it’s here and now from here on in,” (32-33) demonstrating his or her dedication not only to the relationship and other earthly affairs—the “here and now” denoted in the title—but also his or her rejection of the Church and its promises of the eternal afterlife in its own version of heaven—that which is not here or now.
Works Cited
Addison, Joseph. “Self Titled.” The Spectator, 8 March, 1711: n/a. Available at http://www.gutenberg.org/files/12030/12030-h/SV1/Spectator1.html
Dunn, Stephen. "Here and Now." Here and Now: Poems. New York, NY: W. W. Norton &, 2011. Print.
Fazzio, Robert. The Origin, Proliferation, and Institutionalization of Anti-Catholicim in America, and its Impact on Modern Christian Apologetics. Auflage: GRIN Verlag, 2011. Print
Fessendren, Tracy. Culture and Redemption: Religion, the Secular, and American Literature. Princeton: Princeton Press, 2007. Print.
OED Online. Oxford Dictionaries Online. September 2012. Oxford University Press. 19 18 September 2012 http://oxforddictionaries.com
Wrede, Theda. “Book Review: The Story of A: The Alphabetization of America from The New England Primer to The Scarlet Letter.” South Atlantic Modern Language Association 67.1 (2002): 196. Print.
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