{"id":14266,"date":"2014-10-01T02:06:34","date_gmt":"2014-10-01T06:06:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/?p=14266"},"modified":"2014-10-01T02:06:34","modified_gmt":"2014-10-01T06:06:34","slug":"edward-hirsch-gabriel-a-poem","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/2014\/10\/01\/edward-hirsch-gabriel-a-poem\/","title":{"rendered":"Edward Hirsch: Gabriel: A Poem<\/em>"},"content":{"rendered":"

Back in 2010 I came to know Edward Hirsch’s poetry in\u00a0The Living Fire: New and Selected Poems<\/em>, which I suggested should be an American poetry essential (here<\/a>). I’m deeply saddened that my next encounter with Hirsch’s work is a work of grief: Gabriel: A Poem<\/em> (2014). In 2011, Hirsch’s son, Gabriel, disappeared and, after days of frantic worry, was found dead. The book was recently longlisted for the National Book Award for Poetry.<\/p>\n

\"Review
Review copy courtesy of Knopf.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Obviously, this is highly personal material, and I’m often at a loss when it comes to reviewing such a work. I think: how do I evaluate the ability of someone to express his or her grief, which is inexpressible. Then again, poets do this. Their work is emotionally bare, often uncomfortably, and they bravely put it out there for us.<\/p>\n

In fact, Hirsch reminds us of this throughout this entire book, which is one long 78-page poem laid out in tercets. Early on, he notes Ben Jonson’s poem about his dead son, “His best piece of poetrie.” Hirsch seems to have looked to these poets — Anna Akhmatova, Marina Tsvetaeva, Rabindranath Tagore, Giuseppe Ungaretti, Friedrich R\u00fcckert, St\u00e9phane Mallarm\u00e9, William Wordsworth, Jan Kochanowski, Yamanoue no Okura, Izumi Shikibu, Margaretha Susanna von Kuntsch, among others — to see how they handled the inexpressible pain that, in some cases, caused them to quit altogether. He argues with Rainer Maria Rilke for sacrificing everything “for his art”; Hirsch says he once admired Rilke, but:<\/p>\n

Now I think he was a jerk<\/span>
\nFor skipping his daughter’s wedding<\/span>
\nFor fear of losing his focus<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Indeed, Gabriel<\/em>, besides being an elegy for his son, is Hirsch’s confrontation with his vocation in the face of life and death. Now his son is dead, and he writes poetry. While his son was alive, he wrote poetry. There’s a segment where Hirsch seems to be railing against God, but really he is railing against himself:<\/p>\n

And the Father the Law<\/span>
\nWho should have been handing down<\/span>
\nCommandments from on high<\/span><\/p>\n

What was he doing all those years<\/span>
\nWhen he should have been reassuring his wife<\/span>
\nAnd taking charge of his son<\/span><\/p>\n

What was he doing when he should have been<\/span>
\nStanding fast and overruling the experts<\/span>
\nWho were guessing what to do<\/span><\/p>\n

He should have been teaching him<\/span>
\nCharacter teaching him values teaching him<\/span>
\nTo become the man he was meant to become<\/span><\/p>\n

What was he doing the Father the Law<\/span>
\nIn the exact middle of life<\/span>
\nBut fighting for his vocation<\/span><\/p>\n

Ghost of my earlier self<\/span>
\nI see you muttering to yourself<\/span>
\nAnd pacing up and down<\/span><\/p>\n

In a room on the second floor<\/span>
\nOf the house all night every night<\/span>
\nThrough your late forties<\/span><\/p>\n

What were you seeking but escape<\/span>
\nThe transport and the despondency<\/span>
\nOf the old makers<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

And now he is regrettably linked to the old makers’ despondency.<\/p>\n

Of course, rather than focus solely on Hirsch’s relationship with the poets of old, I should also mention how Hirsch approaches his son. There’s genuine sorrow, shock, and anger, and Hirsch doesn’t, to my mind, sentimentalize any of these aspects. Indeed, from the first few stanzas, he subverts sentimentality, offering the cold shock:<\/p>\n

The funeral director opened the coffin<\/span>
\nAnd there he was alone<\/span>
\nFrom the waist up<\/span><\/p>\n

I peered down into his face<\/span>
\nAnd for a moment I was taken aback<\/span>
\nBecause it was not Gabriel<\/span><\/p>\n

It was just some poor kid<\/span>
\nWhose face looked like a room<\/span>
\nThat had been vacated<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

And then the melting:<\/p>\n

But then I looked more intently<\/span>
\nAt his heavy eyelids<\/span>
\nAnd fine features<\/span><\/p>\n

He had always been a restive sleeper<\/span>
\nNow he was weirdly still<\/span>
\nMy reckless boy<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

We learn how Gabriel was reckless. We follow Hirsch through the terrifying aftermath of Hurricane Irene when they discovered they couldn’t find Gabriel. We follow him to a Jersey City police station where they find Gabriel has been dead for a few days, killed by a drug. Hirsch transforms a clinical report on the weights and measures of Gabriel’s body into poetry, especially as it relates to us all and to those old poets and the young bodies they lost. Somehow, the grief is immortal.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Trevor reviews Edward Hirsch’s Gabriel: A Poem<\/em>, a long poem of grief for Hirsch’s son, who died in 2011. This book was recently longlisted for the National Book Award for Poetry. Read the full post<\/u><\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":14267,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"libsyn-item-id":0,"libsyn-show-id":0,"libsyn-post-error":"","libsyn-post-error_post-type":"","libsyn-post-error_post-permissions":"","libsyn-post-error_api":"","playlist-podcast-url":"","libsyn-episode-thumbnail":"","libsyn-episode-widescreen_image":"","libsyn-episode-blog_image":"","libsyn-episode-background_image":"","libsyn-post-episode-category-selection":"","libsyn-post-episode-player_use_thumbnail":"","libsyn-post-episode-player_use_theme":"","libsyn-post-episode-player_height":"","libsyn-post-episode-player_width":"","libsyn-post-episode-player_placement":"","libsyn-post-episode-player_use_download_link":"","libsyn-post-episode-player_use_download_link_text":"","libsyn-post-episode-player_custom_color":"","libsyn-post-episode-itunes-explicit":"","libsyn-post-episode":"","libsyn-post-episode-update-id3":"","libsyn-post-episode-release-date":"","libsyn-post-episode-simple-download":"","libsyn-release-date":"","libsyn-post-update-release-date":"","libsyn-is_draft":"","libsyn-new-media-media":"","libsyn-post-episode-subtitle":"","libsyn-new-media-image":"","libsyn-post-episode-keywords":"","libsyn-post-itunes":"","libsyn-post-episode-itunes-episode-number":"","libsyn-post-episode-itunes-season-number":"","libsyn-post-episode-itunes-episode-type":"","libsyn-post-episode-itunes-episode-title":"","libsyn-post-episode-itunes-episode-author":"","libsyn-destination-releases":"","libsyn-post-episode-advanced-destination-form-data":"","libsyn-post-episode-advanced-destination-form-data-enabled":"","libsyn-post-episode-advanced-destination-form-data-input-enabled":false,"libsyn-post-episode-premium_state":"","libsyn-episode-shortcode":"","libsyn-episode-embedurl":"","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[178],"tags":[781],"coauthors":[505],"class_list":["post-14266","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-edward-hirsch","tag-poetry"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/09\/Gabriel.jpg?fit=368%2C530&ssl=1","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pqqvZ-3I6","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14266","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14266"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14266\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14286,"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14266\/revisions\/14286"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14267"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14266"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14266"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14266"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=14266"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}