The Ship Pounding

By Donald Hall b. 1928 Donald Hall

Each morning I made my way

among gangways, elevators,

and nurses’ pods to Jane’s room

to interrogate the grave helpers

who tended her through the night

while the ship’s massive engines

kept its propellers turning.

Week after week, I sat by her bed

with black coffee and the Globe.

The passengers on this voyage

wore masks or cannulae

or dangled devices that dripped

chemicals into their wrists.

I believed that the ship

traveled to a harbor

of breakfast, work, and love.

I wrote: "When the infusions

are infused entirely, bone

marrow restored and lymphoblasts

remitted, I will take my wife,

bald as Michael Jordan,

back to our dog and day." Today,

months later at home, these

words turned up on my desk

as I listened in case Jane called

for help, or spoke in delirium,

ready to make the agitated

drive to Emergency again

for readmission to the huge

vessel that heaves water month

after month, without leaving

port, without moving a knot,

without arrival or destination,

its great engines pounding.

Source: Without: Poems (1998)

Biography

Considered one of the major American poets of his generation, Donald Hall’s poetry explores the longing for a more bucolic past and reflects the poet’s abiding reverence for nature. Although Hall gained early success with his first collection, Exiles and Marriages (1955), his more recent poetry is generally regarded as the best of his career. Often compared favorably with such writers as James Dickey, Robert Bly, and James . . .

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