Classic and Contemporary Poetry: Explained

Susan Wheeler’s “That Been to Me My Lives Light and Saviour” is a densely layered and surreal poem that draws readers into an allegorical meditation on sustenance, grace, despair, and redemption. The title, echoing devotional language, sets a tone of yearning and spiritual reflection, and the poem unfolds in a fragmented, dreamlike narrative where personal memory, myth, and moral reckoning converge.

The poem opens with a stark invocation: “Purse be full again, or else must I die.” This plea for material sustenance—money, food, or basic provision—becomes a recurring motif. The invocation of “hell’s seventh circle” from Dante’s Inferno, where the violent are condemned, suggests a moral framework where human suffering is tied to excess, greed, or lack. The “lightened purse” is described as a “demon drug,” a poignant critique of dependency, whether on wealth or the false comforts it brings. The interplay between scarcity and abundance threads through the poem, complicating notions of what truly sustains life.

Wheeler employs vivid and unsettling imagery to depict a fractured reality. The “dog loops trees in a figure eight” at a canal, while “a man against a tree nods off.” These scenes evoke disorientation and cyclical futility, a sense that life loops endlessly through struggle and decay. The “figure eight” imagery, symbolizing infinity, contrasts with the ephemerality of the characters’ lives. The man’s nodding off suggests addiction, exhaustion, or resignation, hinting at the toll of endless striving or the solace sought in oblivion.

The father’s act of sorting gravel “by shade and size” offers a moment of peculiar yet tender focus. This seemingly mundane task becomes a metaphor for the human impulse to impose order on chaos, to seek solace in routine. The speaker’s interjection—“Dad! I lied.”—is abrupt and confessional, introducing a raw, unresolved tension within the familial dynamic. The father’s labor and the speaker’s guilt or regret weave into the larger theme of reckoning with one’s past and relationships.

The poem’s central turning point arrives with the “man shifts by the tree and now grace is upon him.” This moment suggests a transformation or revelation, but Wheeler subverts expectations of redemptive clarity. The light that “picks up the coins dropped by travelers” becomes a cruel illumination rather than salvation. The demon dog, now “barking at their glare,” adds to the sense of spiritual and existential disturbance. The poem resists tidy resolutions, instead embracing the ambiguity of grace—whether it redeems, exposes, or simply illuminates.

Wheeler’s language becomes increasingly lyrical and incantatory as the poem progresses, blending biblical cadences with surrealist imagery: “You be my life, you be my heart’s guide, / you be the provision providing more.” These lines evoke prayer or devotion, underscoring the speaker’s deep yearning for sustenance, both physical and spiritual. Yet, this plea is tinged with irony, as the world Wheeler portrays offers little assurance of stability or justice.

The poem’s final stanzas weave personal and mythical elements into a crescendo of awakening. The speaker recounts a dream or vision of being “fed, and clothed, addressed—as though awake.” This dream, chosen over despair, becomes a metaphor for resilience and the human capacity to create meaning amidst adversity. The closing lines, where the speaker rises “weeping” after reading a “full account” pinned to a leaf, suggest an epiphany rooted in both sorrow and renewal. The act of waking—both literal and metaphorical—marks a turning point, a reclamation of agency and acknowledgment of life’s relentless continuity.

“That Been to Me My Lives Light and Saviour” is a deeply complex and evocative poem that interrogates the intersections of materiality, spirituality, and human frailty. Wheeler’s layered imagery and fragmented structure reflect the dissonance of contemporary life, where grace and despair coexist. The poem invites readers to grapple with its paradoxes and, like its speaker, to choose the dream over despair—a testament to the enduring search for meaning in an often chaotic world.

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