It’s been too long since I last posted. And it’s high time Verba Americana came out of hibernation. And so I’ll make my return with a post that may invite a cease and desist notice, considering it was very recently published in a major American magazine. Here is Charles Simic’s haunting poem “The One Who Disappeared.”
Simic is the former poetry editor at the Paris Review, and a recipient of the Pulitzer Prize for The World Doesn’t End (1990).
My interest in terse prose and narrative poetry is no secret, and so I’m not surprised by my admiration of “The One Who Disappeared.” To my mind, it recalls Robert Lowell’s “Skunk Hour” – depicting, as it does, the mystery inherent in warm summer nights in quiet suburban settings. As I did when writing of “Skunk Hour,” I’ll once more link such imagery to the eerie cinematic photographs of Gregory Crewdson.
– Joe