Literary Journal #10 - "Last Words to Miriam" by D. H. Lawrence

Last Words to Miriam

Yours is the shame and sorrow,

       But the disgrace is mine;

Your love was dark and thorough,

Mine was the love of the sun for a flower

       He creates with his shine.

I was diligent to explore you,

       Blossom you stalk by stalk,

Till my fire of creation bore you

Shrivelling down in the final dour

       Anguish — then I suffered a balk.

I knew your pain, and it broke

       My fine, craftsman's nerve;

Your body quailed at my stroke,

And my courage failed to give you the last

       Fine torture you did deserve.

You are shapely, you are adorned,

       But opaque and dull in the flesh,

Who, had I but pierced with the thorned

Fire-threshing anguish, were fused and cast

       In a lovely illumined mesh.

Like a painted window: the best

       Suffering burnt through your flesh,

Undrossed it and left it blest

With a quivering sweet wisdom of grace: but now

       Who shall take you afresh?

Now who will burn you free

       From your body's terrors and dross,

Since the fire has failed in me?

What man will stoop in your flesh to plough

       The shrieking cross?

A mute, nearly beautiful thing

       Is your face, that fills me with shame

As I see it hardening,

Warping the perfect image of God,

       And darkening my eternal fame.

        Maybe this is the reason why so many people dislike D. H. Lawrence. He is not reluctant to say whatever he feels in his mind through his writings. And because he is so attached to the theme of human relationships and shows his agony resulting from them, he is often called a sexist. 

   

        While the poem is constructed with quintets and traditional end rhymes, the theme and the message it carries is quite anti-traditional. Unlike other love poems, Lawrence's use of words and his expressions are extreme and crude. Until it gets to the last stanza, the poem sounds like a complete blame on the narrator's woman, Miriam. I mean, it is pretty unnecessary to name those words or paraphrase the key lines because you can really know what they mean. But once it gets to the last stanza, it becomes clear that the main purpose of the poem is neither blaming Miriam nor discovering the cause of the failure of the relationship, but it is to regret the narrator's inability to continue the relationship, as he puts himself into the position of "shame" and "darken my[his] eternal fame."

 

        To me, D. H. Lawrence is a romanticist rather than a sexist. He is able to throw out his crude emotions on the piece of paper and shape them into order. His genius perfects his poetry in which content and form are united into a finished piece of art.