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MARK DOTY
"The poet's craft -- love of the sheer physical pleasures of language: its sonics, its textures, its rhythms --
is an enormous ally."
Born in 1953 in Maryville, Tennessee, Mark Doty explores our preoccupation with the past and the future and encourages us to live more in the present. Central to his work are animals and his concern for the need to cope nobly and gracefully with what is beyond our control. He teaches at the University of Houston.
"New Dog"
Jimi and Tony
can't keep Dino,
their cocker spaniel;
Tony's too sick,
the daily walks
more pressure
than pleasure,
one more obligation
that can't be met.
And though we already
have a dog, Wally
wants to adopt,
wants something small
and golden to sleep
next to him and
lick his face.
He's paralyzed now
from the waist down,
whatever's ruining him
moving upward, and
we don't know
how much longer
he'll be able to pet
a dog. How many men
want another attachment,
just as they're
leaving the world?
Wally sits up nights
and says, I'd like
some lizards, a talking bird,
some fish. A little rat.
So after I drive
to Jimi and Tony's
in the Village and they
meet me at the door and say,
We can't go through with it,
we can't give up our dog,
I drive to the shelter
-- just to look -- and there
is Beau: bounding and
practically boundless,
one brass concatenation
of tongue and tail,
unmediated energy,
too big, wild,
perfect. He not only
licks Wally's face
but bathes every
irreplaceable inch
of his head, and though
Wally can no longer
feed himself he can lift
his hand, and bring it
to rest on the rough gilt
flanks when they are,
for a moment, still.
I have never seen a touch
so deliberate.
It isn't about grasping;
the hand itself seems
almost blurred now,
softened, though
tentative only
because so much will
must be summoned,
such attention brought
to the work -- which is all
he is now, this gesture
toward the restless splendor,
the unruly, the golden,
the animal, the new.
"Golden Retrievals"
Fetch? Balls and sticks capture my attention
seconds at a time. Catch? I don't think so.
Bunny, tumbling leaf, a squirrel who's -- oh
joy -- actually scared. Sniff the wind, then
I'm off again: muck, pond, ditch, residue
of any thrillingly dead thing. And you?
Either you're sunk in the past, half our walk,
thinking of what you can never bring back,
or else you're off in some fog concerning
-- tomorrow, is that what you call it? My work:
to unsnare time's warp (and woof!), retrieving,
my haze-headed friend, you. This shining bark,
a Zen master's bronzy gong, calls you here,
entirely, now: bow-wow, bow-wow, bow-wow.
"from Messiah (Christmas Portions)"
Who'd have thought
they'd be so good? Every valley,
proclaims the solo tenor,
(a sleek blonde
I've seen somewhere before
-- the liquor store?) shall be exalted,
and in his handsome mouth the word
is lifted and opened
into more syllables
than we could count, central ah
dilated in a baroque melisma,
liquefied; the pour
of voice seems
to make the unplaned landscape
the text predicts the Lord
will heighten and tame.
This music
demonstrates what it claims:
glory shall be revealed. If art's
acceptable evidence,
mustn't what lies
behind the world be at least
as beautiful as the human voice?
The tenors lack confidence,
and the soloists,
half of them anyway, don't
have the strength to found
the mighty kingdoms
these passages propose
-- but the chorus, all together,
equals my burning clouds,
and seems itself to burn,
commingled powers
deeded to a larger, centering claim.
These aren't anyone we know;
choiring dissolves
familiarity in an up-
pouring rush which will not
rest, will not, for a moment,
be still.
Aren't we enlarged
by the scale of what we're able
to desire? Everything,
the choir insists,
might flame;
inside these wrappings
burns another, brighter life,
quickened, now,
by song: hear how
it cascades, in overlapping,
lapidary waves of praise? Still time.
Still time to change.
What calls you here,
entirely, now?
Questions
1. In "Messiah (Christmas Portions)," Mark Doty says, "Who'd have thought / they'd be so good?" Describe an event in which you or someone you know was suddenly or beautifully transformed -- such as in a concert, play, sports event, or dance. Were you surprised? Why? What did you learn about yourself or the other person?
2. Doty writes, "Aren't we enlarged / by the scale of what we're able / to desire?" List five things you most desire. List five things someone you know well desires. How do our desires define us -- make us seem smaller or larger?
3. Something that at first seemed crazy -- writing a poem from a dog's point of view -- eventually produced "Golden Retrievals." Describe something that you at first thought was crazy but that turned out to have a surprising result.
Activities
1. Choose an animal who could dictate something to you. What would the animal say? Include your observations of some of the animal's characteristics as well as its words. What do you think you might learn from the animal?
2. Choose a moment in time -- right now or some time in the past. Pretend you've taken a three-dimensional photo of the moment. Describe as much as you can about the moment, including physical descriptions, feelings, and ideas. What would you change to make the moment more vivid?
3. Both Mark and Jimi experienced their partner's illness due to AIDS. Their dogs, Beau and Dino, helped the ill partners feel better. Create a poster that helps people become aware of AIDS and that suggests possible things they can do to help people who have this disease.
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