I’ve always loved Louise Glück’s poetry, which has always presented an almost Rilkean inwardness. The Nobel literature committee’s choice evidently came as a surprise. After all, the hapless Alex Shephard at The New Republic just two days ago included Glück on his “These Americans Aren’t Going to Win” list. He pegged her odds at 25-1 and added this remark: “Least irritating poet whose work you regularly encounter on Instagram.” Just how irritating she is Mr. Shephard may have occasion to tell us in a future issue of TNR. All we can be sure of at the moment is this: Louise Glück will soon have a Nobel Prize and Alex Shephard will not. Not ever.
by Louise Glück
The great thing
is not having
a mind. Feelings:
oh, I have those; they
govern me. I have
a lord in heaven
called the sun, and open
for him, showing him
the fire of my own heart, fire
like his presence.
What could such glory be
if not a heart? Oh my brothers and sisters,
were you like me once, long ago,
before you were human? Did you
permit yourselves
to open once, who would never
open again? Because in truth
I am speaking now
the way you do. I speak
because I am shattered.
(from The Wild Iris, 1992)