Death & Co
Death & Co - meaning Summary
Split Selves and Mortality
The poem presents a speaker confronting two opposing figures—one impassive, clinical, almost avian and forensic; the other sensual, needy, almost human—both linked to death and control. The speaker remains motionless as these embodiments comment on corpses, infants and desire. Stark imagery (scald scars, icebox, frost) collapses maternal, erotic and violent registers into a single moment of mute witness where life, desire and mortality mingle and someone has been irrevocably lost.
Read Complete AnalysesTwo, of course there are two. It seems perfectly natural now—— The one who never looks up, whose eyes are lidded And balled¸ like Blake's. Who exhibits The birthmarks that are his trademark—— The scald scar of water, The nude Verdigris of the condor. I am red meat. His beak Claps sidewise: I am not his yet. He tells me how badly I photograph. He tells me how sweet The babies look in their hospital Icebox, a simple Frill at the neck Then the flutings of their Ionian Death-gowns. Then two little feet. He does not smile or smoke. The other does that His hair long and plausive Bastard Masturbating a glitter He wants to be loved. I do not stir. The frost makes a flower, The dew makes a star, The dead bell, The dead bell. Somebody's done for.
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