Textual Representation in Poetry—And at the End of Life

Poetry conveys meaning not just via the definitions of words, but also in its intentional arrangement of words on the page, and even in the very letters that comprise them. In “DO NOT RESUS_ITATE,” set at the bedside of a patient at the end of life, this almost alchemical property of poetry is immediately apparent in the title: the all-capitals DNR order not only proclaims that the speaker’s father’s death is imminent, but also suggests in its missing silent “C” that perhaps, if medicine can be mistaken, there is still reason to hope. The mutability of text is further entertained as the poem depicts an unlikely birthday celebration, in the consuming of a cake meant for another patient who has already died. We watch the ephemeral happy birthday message (“squiggled in red and green on frosty white”) disappear bite by bite, each vanishing letter sequence an existential question. “I ate ‘Y B.’ Then ‘B I’,” the speaker flatly notes, the literal instability of the written word a kind of wondering at life’s meaning, amidst the irony of juxtaposing a birthday with death. Meanwhile, a football game’s “sudden death overtime” on the radio in the background underscores the poem’s sense that our time is fleeting. By the conclusion, “R A H was no more,” we are suspended between the sweetness suggested by “I licked the frosting off my plate” and distant cheering as “the fans went wild.” Even as words fail us, and lives fade, poetry insists we can yet rejoice.