DDCPoetry

Original Poem Reprinted Online Here: "The Afterlife: Letter to Sam Hamill" by Hayden Carruth More Information about the Poet: Hayden Carruth This isn't a tough poem as far as readability as an observer.  Actually, it's a pretty fast read and I think people will get this poem without knowing the context, the people, the emotion, or the personal.  This is a hard poem to reread emotionally as a goodbye. Written in a epistolary style, the speaker is able to weave in and out of subject matters because, technically, this isn't a poem -- even the speaker admits that further in the poem.  The poem starts out addressing Sam Hamill (a great poet and translator in his own right, and a friend to Hayden Carruth), "You may think it strange, Sam, that I'm writing / a letter in these circumstances. I thought / it strange too -- the first time." Why would it be strange is pretty irrelevant at this point.  What is important is how the connection is formed through unus...