Classic and Contemporary Poetry: Explained

Robert Wrigley’s "Anatomy of Melancholy" is a sprawling, grotesque, and darkly humorous exploration of identity, memory, and the burdens of masculinity in a rural working-class context. Through vivid imagery, layered narrative, and a tone that alternates between the absurd and the poignant, Wrigley crafts a story that examines the interplay of personal histories, communal myths, and the inevitable tragedies that punctuate human lives. The poem’s title references Robert Burton’s 17th-century tome, a fitting allusion for a piece that delves into the psychological and existential complexities of its characters and their circumstances.

The poem begins with an introduction to Lucy Doolin, whose very name encapsulates the absurdity and weight of the narrative to follow. "Lucy," we are told, is short for "Lucifer," a name loaded with symbolic and familial baggage. His father, "possessed...of both an odd sense of humor / and a deep and immitigable bitterness," named Lucy and his stillborn twin brother "Jesus Christ." This macabre origin story establishes the tone of the poem, where humor and tragedy are inextricably linked. Lucy’s insistence on being called by his diminutive rather than his surname or the title "Mister" further underscores his rejection of paternal authority and societal conventions.

The job Lucy oversees—cleaning trash from the county’s back roads—is as unglamorous as his backstory, yet Wrigley imbues it with a grim poetry. The work includes not only "beer cans and bottles, / all manner of cast-off paper and plastics," but also "the festering / roadkill fresh and ridden with maggotry." This grotesque inventory becomes a metaphor for the detritus of human existence, the castoffs that reflect the community’s habits, failures, and neglect. The slow, methodical process of cleaning—"By fifty-yard increments / then we traveled"—parallels the larger existential grind that frames the lives of Lucy and the narrator.

Stump McCarriston, the dump’s eccentric and malodorous sexton, emerges as a grotesque counterpoint to Lucy. Described as "the ugliest man on earth" and surrounded by the detritus of human consumption, Stump embodies a kind of nihilistic acceptance of his place in the world. His trailer, plastered with "fold-outs and pages / from every Stump-salvaged Playboy and nudie magazine," becomes a shrine to his isolation and primal desires. The scene is both comic and pathetic, reflecting the complex mix of envy, disgust, and curiosity the boys feel toward Stump and his life.

The narrative deepens as it shifts to Stump’s casual violence and peculiar craft: "he took up the .22... and popped / with amazing accuracy three rats... then walked to their carcasses, skinned them out, / and hung their hides... to dry." This act, both gruesome and oddly industrious, captures the raw brutality of survival in this world. Stump’s plan to create a "rat hide / coat" speaks to a twisted form of resourcefulness, one that mirrors the town’s own struggle against the encroaching emptiness of abandoned coal mine shafts and declining industry.

Lucy’s intellectual pursuits, represented by his well-worn copy of The Anatomy of Melancholy, contrast starkly with the visceral realities of his life and work. The boys, unfamiliar with the book’s meaning, are struck by the mysterious connection between its title and the grotesque gallery of Stump’s trailer. This juxtaposition underscores the poem’s thematic tension between the physical and the intellectual, the base and the aspirational. Lucy’s repeated readings of the tome suggest a search for meaning or solace in a world that offers little of either.

The poem’s climactic turn—a murder—shifts the narrative from absurdity to tragedy. Stump shoots Lucy in a scene that is both surreal and symbolically charged: "as he stood fifty feet away, / balanced atop the tub of an ancient wringer washer, / arms extended, like Jesus Christ." The image of Lucy as a crucified figure ties back to his twin brother’s name and underscores the futility and inevitability of his fate. Stump’s defense—that "Lucifer... had told him to"—adds a final layer of dark irony, framing the act as both a personal vendetta and a manifestation of the mythic weight Lucy has carried throughout his life.

The poem concludes with a reflection on the passage of time and the fates of the narrator’s companions: "Of the seven of us, one would die in Vietnam, / one... would hang himself... the others / merely gone." This litany of loss and disappearance emphasizes the transient and fragile nature of life in their community. The narrator’s survival, and his role as the story’s teller, underscores the importance of memory and narrative in preserving the humanity of those who have been lost or forgotten.

"Anatomy of Melancholy" is a richly layered exploration of human vulnerability, the absurdities of existence, and the inescapable weight of personal and communal histories. Through its vivid characters, grotesque imagery, and lyrical storytelling, Robert Wrigley crafts a narrative that is both darkly comic and profoundly moving. The poem serves as a testament to the resilience of memory and the ways in which we seek to make sense of lives defined by contradiction, hardship, and fleeting moments of grace.

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