Lately by Patricia Fargnoli

Lately              

by Patricia Fargnoli

Sometimes, at night I venture out 


into the roiling universe, just stand


on the front lawn, head bent back,


imagine myself out to those far edges.

What redeems terror but beauty?


Death keeps trying to collect.


The brain’s old steam train 


chugs into obsolescence.

I think of Hubble photographs–


whole galaxies whirling                 


until we down here seem 


miniature– as insignificant as toy soldiers

among quilt hills & valleys. How strange


these inflations of ourselves we make 


and hold on to when all around us


the night is falling down.

What a beautiful poem this is!

I especially like the opposites used in this poem, especially that first one: the roiling universe and the front lawn. This makes us understand right away that the speaker is going to be with us in our own little worlds while also taking us to distant galaxies.

The next pair is terror and beauty, and seeing as how that second stanza is about dying, we can surmise that the speaker may be experiencing terror due to her own impending death. (The poet, Patricia Fargnoli, died in 2021.) Or it could be just the realization that she--as are we all--is mortal.

In stanza three, the speaker experiences what many of us do when we see photographs from space--the realization of how small we are! Those large areas that are visible in the night skies make us seem even smaller. I like how she calls us "toy soldiers"--they are stiff and still, and she pairs that with the whirling of the galaxies. It also speaks to humans' violent natures; she could have called us "dolls."

In the last stanza, she continues with the "we" started in the third stanza, further pulling in the reader. The speaker chastizes us a little for our human characteristic of pumping ourselves up to be more than we are, as well as increasing the value of things we hold dear. The poem ends with another comparison of opposites: how humans blow up our importance while the night sky is actually expansive and impressive.

"When all around us the night is falling down" is such a gorgeous phrase and what a way to end this poem. Might the speaker mean it sadly, a return to the idea of dying that was introduced in the second stanza? Yes, quite possibly. But it is still a beautiful image and how it is stated here is perfection.

This poem was published in Peacock Journal in November 2017. You can see it, and a few other of Fargnoli's poems, here. Also, just because I think this is interesting, she published her first book of poetry at age 62. After that, she published steadily and won a number of awards. The Poetry Foundation does not record her as having died (putting this here because it is odd), but her obituary is online.