The Flurry

When we talk about when to tell the kids,

we are so together, so concentrated.

I mutter, “I feel like a killer.” “I’m

the killer”—taking my wrist—he says,

holding it. He is sitting on the couch,

the old indigo chintz around him,

rich as a night sea with jellies,

I am sitting on the floor. I look up at him,          

as if within some chamber of matedness,                           

some dust I carry around me. Tonight,

to breathe its Magellanic field is less

painful, maybe because he is drinking

a wine grown where I was born—fog,

eucalyptus, sempervirens—and I’m

sharing the glass with him. “Don’t catch

my cold,” he says, “—oh that’s right, you want

to catch my cold.” I should not have told him that,

I tell him I will try to fall out of

love with him, but I feel I will love him

all my life. He says he loves me

as the mother of our children, and new troupes    

of tears mount to the acrobat platforms

of my ducts and do their burning leaps.

Some of them jump straight sideways, and, for a

moment, I imagine a flurry

of tears like a whirra of knives thrown

at a figure, to outline it—a heart’s spurt

of rage. It glitters, in my vision, I nod

to it, it is my hope

 

-Sharon Olds

 

Commentary

I love how real Olds' poems feel since they are based off her own life. In this poem, Olds and her husband are going to separate and have to find a way to tell the children. Olds is thinking about a lot here, from how the children will react to her own emotions. I don't think she wants to go through the divorce because she still loves him, yet she knows that the divorce will be for the best since he no longer loves her as his wife. It is a very sad poem, especially since it is from Olds' point of view and it is clear she doesn't want go through this. It's like she loves him enough to let him go. It must be painful to let someone go that you love so much. The divorce has clearly evoked a strong reaction from Olds. Like most of Olds' poems, this is a free verse poem. It can also be seen as a narrative poem since it does in fact tell a story.  I love how she uses ordinary objects to describe her feelings. For example, how she says "I imagine a flurry of tears like a whirra of knives thrown at a figure." It makes sense because like those knives are being thrown at someone, her tears are directed at her soon to be ex-husband. A divorce does seem like a rough thing to go through, and Olds makes that clear in this poem.