Classic and Contemporary Poetry: Explained

Tony Hoagland’s "Properly" is a meditation on beauty, intimacy, and the way a single moment—such as a kiss—can both contain and erase history. The poem captures the complexity of attraction, the strangeness of human connection, and the way past experience lingers even as one attempts to inhabit the present. Through a combination of sensual detail, historical allusion, and fairy-tale imagery, Hoagland explores the intersection of desire, memory, and transformation.

The poem opens with an invitation to "Look at this woman, properly a little gawky to compensate for being beautiful." The phrase "properly a little gawky" immediately introduces a subtle tension—beauty, in its pure form, is too much, too overwhelming, and so there must be an imperfection to balance it. The idea that she is "compensating" suggests that awkwardness makes her more approachable, more real. This contrast between grace and vulnerability, between idealization and reality, runs throughout the poem.

The next image captures her in a moment of casual presence: "how her pale breasts dangle in a sky-blue shirt arched above her cat." The use of "dangle" emphasizes a lack of self-consciousness, a natural ease. The phrase "arched above her cat" suggests a domestic, almost unconscious intimacy—this is not a carefully constructed pose but an organic moment, suffused with light and comfort.

The speaker then questions his own perception: "Who is this character in the sunlit living room and how did she become so willing to embrace you at the fateful juncture of a telephone directory and a tropical plant?" The word "character" distances her slightly, making her feel like a figure in a story rather than just a woman in a room. The setting—"a telephone directory and a tropical plant"—grounds the moment in the mundane, reinforcing the randomness of human connection. The juxtaposition of the everyday (a phone book) with something lush and exotic (a tropical plant) mirrors the contrast between the ordinary and the extraordinary in relationships. The phrase "so willing to embrace you" implies both wonder and disbelief—how did the speaker arrive at this moment? How did fate conspire to make this embrace possible?

The poem then shifts into metaphor: "Doesn?t she remind you of a sunset or a drug to make you talk?" The sunset suggests fleeting beauty, an inevitable ending that is already embedded within the moment. The comparison to "a drug to make you talk" implies that she has an intoxicating, disinhibiting effect, that her presence alters perception and speech. This is not just attraction—it is transformation, an altered state of being.

The next lines introduce a historical parallel: "You think Columbus may have felt like this, / sailing closer to the shore that turned him into an American." This comparison is both humorous and profound. Columbus, unaware of what he was discovering, was transformed by reaching land—just as the speaker, approaching this woman, is about to be changed by contact. There is also an irony here: Columbus did not know what he was finding, just as the speaker does not yet fully grasp what this connection will mean. The implication is that all great encounters—whether with a new continent or a new lover—carry the potential for reinvention.

The poem then moves into a reflection on past experience: "You have traveled far as in a fairy tale and passed through many arms like foreign lands." This line reframes personal history as a mythic journey, a tale of exploration. The comparison of past lovers to "foreign lands" suggests both adventure and distance—each experience was a discovery, but none were home. The phrase "but now you are rather like a child, just trying to stand still" signals a shift from wandering to stillness, from conquest to presence. The speaker recognizes that this moment is different, requiring a different kind of engagement—not movement, but stillness; not searching, but accepting.

This recognition leads to a delicate act of belief: "a man who would believe in anything credible enough to get his mouth mixed up with hers." The phrase "believe in anything credible enough" captures the precarious balance between skepticism and surrender. The speaker is not naïve—he has traveled, he has known other lovers—but he is willing to trust this moment, if only because the immediate physical reality of it makes belief possible. The idea of "getting his mouth mixed up with hers" is both intimate and disorienting; a kiss is not just a meeting but a blending, an entanglement of selves.

The poem concludes with a meditation on the first kiss: "The first kiss must be very softly launched, / not to change the shape or subject of these lips / into those of others you have known." This is both a physical and an emotional caution. The "soft launch" suggests the need for delicacy, for not overwhelming the moment with expectation or past experience. The phrase "not to change the shape or subject" is particularly poignant—it acknowledges that the memory of other kisses, other lovers, is always present, threatening to intrude. There is a fear that history will repeat itself, that past relationships will impose themselves onto this new beginning.

The final image solidifies this idea: "like footsteps which, having got you here, / now need to be forgotten so that history might lie down and be made." The footsteps represent the speaker’s past—the lovers, the mistakes, the lessons learned. They have brought him to this moment, but they must now be left behind. The phrase "so that history might lie down and be made" suggests that in order to create something new, one must stop carrying the past forward. There is a beautiful paradox here—history is not erased, but it must lie down in order to allow the present to take shape. The act of forgetting, or at least setting aside memory, is what makes new beginnings possible.

"Properly" is a meditation on presence, memory, and the transformative power of desire. Hoagland captures the strange mix of history and immediacy that defines human connection—the way attraction is both a culmination of past experience and an opportunity to break from it. The poem’s use of metaphor and historical allusion deepens its exploration of intimacy, suggesting that every moment of new love is both a continuation of history and a chance to rewrite it. Ultimately, the poem suggests that the true challenge of love is not just finding someone, but allowing oneself to truly arrive—to let go of past journeys, to stand still, and to believe.

Copyright (c) 2025 PoetryExplorer

Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!

Other Poems of Interest...