Classic and Contemporary Poetry: Explained

Lucia Maria Perillo’s "Body Mutinies" is a restrained yet deeply evocative poem about the moment of receiving a life-altering diagnosis, the way language fails in the face of such an event, and the quiet, surreal clarity that follows. Through precise imagery and a subdued, reflective tone, the poem captures the disorientation that comes with the knowledge of bodily betrayal—how the body, once taken for granted, suddenly becomes an adversary.

The poem begins with a setting: “outside St. Pete’s.” This brief phrase grounds the speaker in a specific location, presumably a hospital or medical office. The casual abbreviation “St. Pete’s” suggests familiarity, as if this place has become a regular presence in the speaker’s life.

The moment of revelation is introduced bluntly: “When the doctor runs out of words and still / I won’t leave, he latches my shoulder and steers me out doors.” The doctor “runs out of words”—a striking phrase that suggests not just the conclusion of an explanation but the limits of language itself. There is nothing more to say, and yet the speaker is unable to move, unwilling or unable to fully process what has been spoken. The verb “latches” is significant—it suggests both a mechanical detachment and an act of reluctant care. Rather than offering comfort, the doctor physically “steers” the speaker outside, emphasizing a sense of forced transition from the clinical space to the external world.

The next lines convey the speaker’s stunned perspective: “Where I see his blurred hand, / through the milk glass, flapping goodbye like a sail.” The “blurred hand” indicates that the speaker is not fully present, their vision distorted either by shock or literal movement. The phrase “milk glass” adds to this sense of separation—there is now a barrier between the speaker and the doctor, between knowledge and the world outside. The image of the doctor’s hand “flapping goodbye like a sail” is both gentle and disorienting. A sail suggests movement, departure, but also something unmoored, drifting. This simile conveys the sensation of being left adrift after devastating news.

The speaker reflects on the speed and finality of the diagnosis: “(& me not griefstruck yet but still amazed: / how words and names—medicine’s blunt instruments— / undid me.” The use of parentheses creates an aside, as if the speaker is still mentally stepping outside of themselves, observing their reaction rather than fully inhabiting it. They are “not griefstruck yet”—suggesting that the weight of the news has not fully settled, that they are still in the realm of astonishment rather than sorrow. The phrase “how words and names—medicine’s blunt instruments— / undid me” is especially powerful. Here, language is framed as something crude, inadequate for the magnitude of what it conveys. Medical terminology, which is supposed to diagnose and explain, instead “undid” the speaker—disassembling their sense of self, reducing them to a condition, a name for an affliction.

The next lines capture the passage of time in this stunned state: “And the seconds, the half seconds it took / for him to say those words.” The slowing down of time is palpable—each fraction of a second stretching, elongating the moment of comprehension. The structure of the line mirrors this fragmentation, as if the speaker is replaying the doctor’s words in their mind, dissecting the brief instant that changed everything.

Instead of dramatizing the moment further, the poem shifts to quiet observation: “For now, I’ll just stand in the courtyard, / watching bodies struggle in then out of one lean shadow / a tall fir lays across the wet flagstones.” The phrase “For now” signals the speaker’s suspended state—unable to act, caught in a liminal space between before and after. The image of “bodies struggle in then out of one lean shadow” suggests an indifferent, ongoing world where people continue to move, unaware of the speaker’s internal upheaval. The “tall fir” and “wet flagstones” add texture to this external landscape, reinforcing the quiet, almost cinematic quality of the scene. The “lean shadow” of the fir becomes a subtle metaphor for the speaker’s condition—something looming but impermanent, a mark cast across the world rather than a force of destruction itself.

The poem ends with a final image, rendered with striking clarity: “Before the sun clears the valance of gray trees / and finds the surgical-supply shop’s window / and makes the dusty bedpans glint like coins.” Here, the external world continues its motion—the sun moves, light shifts, objects are illuminated. The phrase “clears the valance of gray trees” suggests an eventual breaking through of light, though the “gray” retains an atmosphere of muted sadness. The final image—“the surgical-supply shop’s window” and the “dusty bedpans glint[ing] like coins”—is especially poignant. The bedpans, symbols of bodily weakness and hospital confinement, are transformed by light into something almost valuable, almost golden. This moment of alchemy—where the mundane is momentarily made radiant—parallels the speaker’s own reckoning with mortality. The body, even as it mutinies, is still part of this world, still capable of catching light.

"Body Mutinies" is a poem of quiet devastation. Rather than dramatizing illness, Perillo captures the in-between moment—the space between diagnosis and acceptance, between understanding and grief. The external world remains indifferent, but within that indifference, there are flashes of beauty, moments of strange clarity. The body’s betrayal is unavoidable, but the speaker’s awareness of it is what gives the poem its power: in that courtyard, watching bodies move in and out of shadow, the speaker stands still, not yet fully griefstruck, but irrevocably changed.

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