Don't you love to hear two versions of the same story? Be it an argument, an accident or a memory, I always enjoy listening to the different accounts of both implied parties, comparing impressions and ways of experiencing things.
The same happens with poetry, we sometimes have two accounts of a similar event or character, like in this case: Same title, same character (a
mailman) but completely different stories.
Mark Strand's poetry (see previous
entry) is known for a clarity reminiscent of the paintings of
Edward Hopper, and for a deeply inward sense of language. His poems tell a story in a couple of lines, carrying heavy meaning, such as this one where there is a visit by the mailman at midnight.
Then we have
Franz Wright (1953-2015), an Austrian-born but California-raised poet whose scale of experience runs from the homicidal to the ecstatic. His observation of the mailman (and by extent, ours) seems to summarise the agony of existence.
The Mailman
by Mark Strand
It is midnight.
He comes up the walk
and knocks at the door.
I rush to greet him.
He stands there weeping,
shaking a letter at me.
He tells me it contains
terrible personal news.
He falls to his knees.
“Forgive me! Forgive me!” he pleads.
I ask him inside.
He wipes his eyes.
His dark blue suit
is like an inkstain
on my crimson couch.
Helpless, nervous, small,
he curls up like a ball
and sleeps while I compose
more letters to myself
in the same vein:
“You shall live
by inflicting pain.
You shall forgive.”
The Mailman
by Franz Wright
From the third floor window
you watch the mailman’s slow progress
through the blowing snow.
As he goes from door to door
he might be searching
for a room to rent,
unsure of the address,
which he keeps stopping to check
in the outdated and now
obliterated clipping
he holds, between thickly gloved fingers,
close to his eyes
in a hunched and abruptly
simian posture
that makes you turn away,
quickly switching off the lamp.
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| Portrait of the Postman Joseph Roulin (1888) by Vincent Van Gogh |
