Irish poet Derek Mahon R.I.P. (1941-2020)
Heraclitus on Rivers
Nobody steps into the same river twice.
The same river is never the same
Because that is the nature of water.
Similarly your changing metabolism
Means that you are no longer you.
The cells die, and the precise
Configuration of the heavenly bodies
When she told you she loved you
Will not come again in this lifetime.
You will tell me that you have executed
A monument more lasting than bronze;
But even bronze is perishable.
Your best poem, you know the one I mean,
The very language in which the poem
Was written, and the idea of language,
All these things will pass away in time.
Derek Mahon from Selected Poems, Penguin, 2000
Something especially poignant about this poem today, the day after Derek Mahon died in Kinsale, Ireland aged seventy-eight. He has passed away but, not yet, his poems or their language or the idea of language. And somehow then, more than ever it seems to matter to celebrate poems and poets and life and living that, yes, includes dying. And to celebrate Derek and also perhaps his best-known and widely celebrated poem Everything Is Going To Be All Right and these lines:
There will be dying, there will be dying,
but there is no need to go into that.
The lines flow from the hand unbidden
and the hidden source is the watchful heart
Derek Mahon from his poem Everything Is Going To Be All Right
But today, I disagree Derek. There is a need, there is a need to go into dying, into your death and speak grief, cry the havoc of death and dying and not only your death but all the deaths of yesterday and today, some so-called natural and many not, from disease, war, poverty, starvation. This need to say, no, everything is not all right. No, no. To say your poem, its celebration of beauty and sunlight brings no comfort. Today, through my dormer window, no clouds flying but for sure “a riot of sunlight” but “there is no need to go into that.” Not today, Derek. Not today!
But how can I ignore your yes. This likely your best-known poem:
Everything Is Going to Be All Right
How should I not be glad to contemplate
the clouds clearing beyond the dormer window
and a high tide reflected on the ceiling?
There will be dying, there will be dying,
but there is no need to go into that.
The poems flow from the hand unbidden
and the hidden source is the watchful heart.
The sun rises in spite of everything
and the far cities are beautiful and bright.
I lie here in a riot of sunlight
watching the day break and the clouds flying.
Everything is going to be all right.
Derek Mahon, ibid
The poet and renowned speaker on all things poetry, David Whyte introduced me to this poem years ago. One of many great gifts he has given me and others. I have it memorized and use it often in my twice-a-week poetry therapy sessions at Homewood Ravensview in Victoria. To celebrate that which is not dying or dead. To celebrate the wonders of being alive and the marvels that surround us. Not the terrors. Even if only for a moment.
The genius of this poem! Summed up for me in two lines. The two lines that set this poem apart and make it timeless. Elevate it way beyond anything sentimental or dare I say, Hallmarkish. There will be dying, there will be dying. Wham, there it is. The needed tension in the poem. The contrast that makes everything else in the poem sharpper, brighter. Makes the ending believable. Everything is going to be all right. And that seemingly off-the-cuff line, its conversational quality: there is no need to go into that. Or to put it another way: let’s not think about this for now!
And talk about wonders. How poems arrive! Suddenly in this poem an unexpected ars poetica. This is the “how” of poetry! It comes unbidden and the hidden source is the watchful heart. In other words keep paying attention. Stay present. The watchful heart. Even when it hurts to do so as it does today. Bless you Derek. Harder to say now. “There will be dying, there will be dying.“