Classic and Contemporary Poetry: Explained

"Totting It Up" by Stephen Dobyns is a poignant reflection on the quantification of a human life through a stark and somewhat sardonic enumeration of its components. The poem strips away the romanticism often associated with life’s milestones and instead presents an inventory of existence, counting everything from boots to heart attacks. This catalog serves not only as a reminder of the material and experiential aspects of life but also underscores the fleeting and often overlooked impact of an individual over generations.

The poem begins with mundane purchases: boots and cars. "He bought one pair of boots, then another...He had a four boots life. He bought twelve cars. He had a twelve car life." The repetition of "life" following each numerical detail emphasizes how we often define our lives and identities by what we accumulate, suggesting a consumerist perspective on existence where worth and memory are tied to physical objects.

The progression to more intimate details, such as the number of orgasms, wives, children, and grandchildren, deepens the personal nature of the inventory. However, the reduction of these deeply human experiences to mere numbers creates a jarring effect, challenging the reader to consider how such significant aspects of life might be trivialized or forgotten over time. The mention of "fifty-three hundred orgasms but hungered for a few hundred more" particularly highlights the unending human desire for more, a theme that resonates throughout the poem.

Dobyns then shifts from life’s pleasures to its pains and challenges, counting cups of coffee and amounts of spaghetti consumed, as well as heart attacks endured and hospital stays. Each statistic adds a layer to the portrait of the man, illustrating a life marked by both mundanity and crisis. The "five heart attack life" and the subsequent list of medical aids used—a pair of crutches, a wheelchair—depict the deterioration of the body, presenting a stark contrast to the earlier, more vibrant activities.

The finality of life is captured poignantly as Dobyns describes how the man’s memories "vanished like bubbles from a glass of champagne." This metaphor suggests the fragility and impermanence of life’s moments and memories, which, although vivid and delightful at the time, inevitably fade away. The poem concludes with the man's last suit and coffin turning to dust, symbolizing the complete erasure of physical existence.

Yet, it is in the generational aftermath that Dobyns’s narrative reaches its most profound commentary. The man becomes progressively less significant over time—from a "face" to a "name" to a "vacancy." This diminishing legacy culminates in the ultimate indifference of the world to the individual: a road is built over his grave, and life continues to move on, indifferent to the one who once existed there.

The closing image of the "brightly disappearing speck" serves as a powerful metaphor for the human condition. It suggests that no matter the breadth of our experiences or the depth of our impacts, we all eventually fade into the distance of collective memory and history.

In "Totting It Up," Stephen Dobyns crafts a compelling meditation on mortality, memory, and the material measurements we often use to summarize a life. Through his stark, unsentimental catalog, Dobyns invites the reader to reflect on the transient nature of existence and the inevitability of oblivion, reminding us of the impersonal forces of time that render individual lives into mere footnotes in the continuous march of history.

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