THE MOUNTAIN
by Louise Glück
My students look at me expectantly.
I explain to them that the life of art is a life
of endless labor. Their expressions
hardly change; they need to know
a little more about endless labor
So I tell them the story of Sisyphus,
how he was doomed to push
a rock up a mountain, knowing nothing
would come of this effort
but that he would repeat it
indefinitely. I tell them
there is joy in this, in the artist’s life,
that one eludes
judgment, and as I speak
I am secretly pushing a rock myself,
slyly pushing it up the steep
face of a mountain. Why do I lie
to these children? They aren’t listening,
they aren’t deceived, their fingers
tapping at the wooden desks—
So I retract
the myth; I tell them it occurs
in hell and that the artist lies
because he is obsessed with attainment,
that he perceives the summit
as that place where he will live forever,
a place about to be
transformed by his burden: with every breath,
I am standing at the top of the mountain.
Both my hands are free. And the rock has added
height to the mountain.
[from The Triumph of Achilles, 1985]
~~~~
Louise Glück c. 1968
~~~~
Many years ago I taught a class in contemporary poetry, using five full books of poems. Louise Glück’s second book, The House on Marshland, was one. Published a year or two earlier (making the class in 1976 or ’77), I remember being completely bowled over by it, as were all my students, all of whom were aspiring poets. The poems were radiant, all emotional intimacy wrestling with emotional distance—a vibrant tension. This tension turned out to be the mainspring of her work. As Glück put it at the end of her Nobel Lecture, “I believe that in awarding me this prize, the Swedish Academy is choosing to honor the intimate, private voice, which public utterance can sometimes augment or extend, but never replace.”
I believe we’d have to turn to Rilke to find a similar mainspring so powerfully at work—though Rilke gives us temporary destinations seen in the context of the journey, while Glück gives us destinations with the journey to them firmly in the rearview mirror. Rilke is tension followed by release, Glück release remembering the tension that produced it. I recommend reading them side by side.
Joseph Hutchison, Colorado Poet Laureate 2014-2019, has published 20 collections of poems and edited or co-edited three poetry anthologies. He currently directs two master’s-level programs for University College at the University of Denver: Professional Creative Writing and Arts & Culture Management. Joe lives with his wife, Melody Madonna, in the mountains southwest of Denver, Colorado, the city where he was born. 
An oldie but a goodie, Beth! Thanks for posting. Here’s one from THE HOUSE ON MARSHLAND, suitable for Halloween:
ALL HALLOWS
Even now this landscape is assembling.
The hills darken. The oxen
sleep in their blue yoke,
the fields having been
picked clean, the sheaves
bound evenly and piled at the roadside
among cinquefoil, as the toothed moon rises:
This is the barrenness
of harvest or pestilence.
And the wife leaning out the window
with her hand extended, as in payment,
and the seeds
distinct, gold, calling
“Come here
Come here, little one”
And the soul creeps out of the tree.
___________
I should add that the wife’s summons is italicized in the original, not in quotes. I can’t seem to make italics in a comment box!
Thank you, Joe, for your sharing your lucid words honoring Louise Gluck. She was an inspiration to me early on and I always wished I could hear her read in person. Here is one of my own favorites, a rather untypical short poem:
Cottonmouth Country
Fish bones walked the waves off Hatteras.
And there were other signs
That Death wooed us, by water, wooed us
By land: among the pines
An uncurled cottonmouth that rolled on moss
Reared in the polluted air.
Birth, not death, is the hard loss.
I know. I also left a skin there.
When I earned my MA all those years ago someone gave me “The Wild Iris,” my introduction to Louise Glück. Insightful comments about her here and I love the poem you selected. Like Sisyphus’ work, you tell your students. No, they think, not for me. I’ll be atop that mountain in no time.
If there is indeed a sacred and eternal mountain of the arts, she should be there.
One of my favorite poets
What a wonderful memory, Dan. I had no idea you’d studied with her! Such a privilege. If there is such a thing as an “old soul,” she certainly had one.
And Karen, yes—read her! Her “Collected Poems” (https://bookshop.org/p/books/poems-1962-2012-louise-gluck/15602061?ean=9780374534097) is like one of those memory palaces the Romans used to enhance their powers of recall. A wonder in itself. If Collecteds overwhelm you, I recommend starting with “The House on Marshland,” then “The Triumph of Achilles” and “The Wild Iris.”
Lisa, your collection “The Hours I Keep” seems to me in the Glück ballpark. Great depth and great restraint making a delicious tension….
Thanks Joe,
What a profoundly wise poem, one that draws upon myth and ancient history, and one that reveals Nobel Laureate, Louise Gluck, as a person of multiple perspectives, holistic, and world centric. She was one of my teachers over fifty years ago when I attended the Iowa Workshop, empathetic and more sage than academic. In 1973, when I was transitioning back from a very dark place, she said I was the first Vietnam combat veteran she ever had in a class; and then she welcomed me home.
Thanks for this, I’ll put her books on my wish list.
Thank you for this thoughtful post on a remarkable poet.