Abraham Lincoln
In the poem "Abraham Lincoln," taken from the collection, History (1973), Lowell elegizes the assassinated American president. Lowell addresses him directly and speaks of him glowingly, writing, "you may have loved underdogs and even mankind, / this one thing made you different from your equals" (149). Later, he refers to Lincoln as "our one genius in politics" (149). In this sense, Lincoln stands as a symbol for the American potential, and the strength of American ingenuity and democracy. At the same time, his assassination symbolizes the violent and turbulent history of America.
The Matchlight
In the poem, "Eye and Teeth," from the celebrated collection For the Union Dead (1964), Lowell writes, "I lay all day on my bed. / I chain-smoked through the night, / Learning to flinch / At the flash of the matchlight (101). For much of his life, Lowell suffered from poor mental health and was diagnosed with manic-depression. As a result, was hospitalized numerous times throughout his life. Lowell was quite candid about his struggles and they often appear in his work, as in the case of "Eye and Teeth." This stanza is the depiction of a man who is nervous and obviously unwell. The match is the symbol of both hope and despair. While it lights the speaker's cigarettes and illuminates the darkness, it also causes the speaker to flinch before quickly extinguishing. Lowell's candid presentation of his unwellness, as seen in this poem, is part of what makes him such a novel and remarkable poet.
The Skunks
Perhaps Lowell's most famous poem, "Skunk Hour," was included in his acclaimed 1959 collection Life Studies. In the poem, Lowell describes Nautilus Island, a region of Maine in which he often vacationed in the summers. Later in the poem, the speaker reveals that he drives around the region looking for "love-cars." That is to say, he attempts to spy on people in moments of intimacy. As such, he reveals that his "mind's not right." The poem concludes with the speaker coming across "a mother skunk with her column of kittens" eating from a garbage can. The skunks, which are typically depicted as gross, scavenging creatures, actually symbolize the speaker, who in his unwell state also scavenges for intimacy and connection in the nighttime.
The Locked Razor
In the poem "Waking in the Blue," also from 1959's Life Studies, Lowell describes his experience while imprisoned for refusing to participate in the Second World War. In the poem, the speaker has a series of unusual encounters, including with "Stanley, now sunk in his sixties / once a Harvard all-American full-back." Despite his imprisonment, the speaker's tone is calm and accepting; however, as the poem ends, Lowell writes, "we are all old-timers / each of us holds a locked razor." This is another reference to Lowell's mental health. While his unwellness lead him several times to contemplate suicide, "a locked razor" prevented him from doing so. Even though the poem has a calm, even humorous tone, the "locked razor" indicates that the speaker experiences a mental turmoil from which he cannot escape.
LOVEL
Robert Lowell came from a wealthy and prestigious New England family, often referred to as a "Boston Brahmin." In the poem "Sailing Home from Rapallo," from Life Studies, Lowell addresses how, in the grand scheme of life, the illustriousness of his lineage actually means very little. In the poem, he writes of a trip to Rapallo, Italy with his mother. During the trip, Lowell's mother died, and so her son has to accompany the body back to America to be buried. After ruminating on the sea voyage, Lowell concludes the poem with the lines, "in the grandiloquent lettering on Mother's coffin, Lowell had been misspelled Lovel." In this sense, the spelling mistake symbolizes the fact that, in death, Lowell's mother's class or prestige meant nothing. Although she came from an incredibly important family, her name would in time be misspelled or forgotten.
