"Luke Havergal" by Edwin Arlington Robinson

Topics discussed in this episode include:

-Quotable comebacks

-My listeners down under! 

-Everyone should know about Ern Malley 

-A hearty thanks to my very first patrons! 

-You too can nourish the fiscal integrity of the show here. 

-Candidate for American poetry GOAT, Edwin Arlington Robinson. 

-Adventurer, soldier, and fairy god-fan Kermit Roosevelt.

-The Tom Bradys of the Pulitzer Prize in Poetry

-Killer Robinson poems Aunt Imogen, Rembrandt to Rembrandt, and Lancelot.

-The Troubadour effect

-Red vines, but not the sweet kind

-There's always a woman.

-A dead woman. 

-A wailing demon-lover.

-Heeeeeerrree's Milton! (Take a shot)

-The suicidal tendencies of a pantheistic God 

-Paul Valery's "Sketch of A Serpent." 

-"This creation thing is really killing me"-- God

-"This Jesus thing is really killing me" -- God

-Inferno XIII 

-Dante's "Contra Passo"

-Inferno III 

-The Golem

-Luke has the gall

-The Galenic theory of humors

-Orpheus and Eurydice in reverse

-But is it an evil poem?

Text of the poem here.

Transcript

Versecraft Episode 3-2: “Luke Havergal” by Edwin Arlington Robinson 

            In the year 1896, Edwin Arlington Robinson was seeking to get his first book of poetry published. No one wanted it. He amassed, or so he claimed, a pile of rejections that “must have been one of the largest and most comprehensive in literary history.” In desperation, he published his manuscript with a vanity press, and sent out this first collection to any editors willing to give him the time of day. He did get some favorable responses, but not from everyone: reviewing his work, the critic Harry Thurston Peck, struck by what he took to be a distasteful quantity of pessimism, wrote of Robinson, “the world is not beautiful to him, but a prison house.” Robinson, in one of my favorite quotes of all time, replied: “The world is not a prison house, but a kind of spiritual kindergarten, where millions of bewildered infants are trying to spell God with the wrong blocks.” The simultaneous wretchedness, amused irony, and patient hope of Robinson’s world view are epitomized by this brilliant, world-weary quote from a poet who was at that time in his mid-twenties. 

            Before we explore the genius of Robinson though, I’d like to thank those of you generous angels who have become the first paying subscribers to Versecraft: these include my dear mother, who really didn’t have to do that, Mr. David Goldblatt, and the most famous Australian poet of all time, Ern Malley, who is definitely a real person and definitely not my favorite Australian podcaster in disguise. Honestly though I really shouldn’t make assumptions, because I know there are actually Aussies plural who listen to my show. As a matter of fact, shout out to my Australian listeners in general—you guys are awesome, and I promise that one day I’ll do an A.D. Hope episode especially for you, because I know you would all love that so much. 

            To all the rest of you dear listeners, thank you so much for your ears, your loyalty, and your spiritual support. If at any point you have the irresistible urge to give me money on a monthly basis, please see the link in my show notes to my buymeacoffeepage where you can self-initiate into the Order of the Lyre, the Order of the Laurel, or the Order of Orpheus—dark caves and ergot-infected barley not included. If you feel any trepidation or incertitude at the idea of paying monthly for what you can get for free, I completely understand, and would urge you to simply consider a little tip whenever you’ve particularly enjoyed an episode. You can tip the show at the same link, it’s very fast and easy, and I don’t believe requires any account. Other free ways to help support the show include giving it a rating and review on Apple Music or your preferred podcasting service, or even better, just telling a friend about the show whom you think might like it. I deeply appreciate all of those things. 

            Now, back to Robinson. I’m particularly excited about this episode, because Edwin Arlington Robinson is one of my top three favorite American poets of all time. Today’s poem, “Luke Havergal,” is actually one of his better-known poems, but it’s so beautiful, so haunting, and still so underrated that I couldn’t resist. I should add a content warning here that this episode will heavily feature discussion of suicide and suicide ideation. That being said, let’s get into this. 

            The life of Robinson, while always an unhappy one due to unrequited love, the early deaths of family members, and alcoholism, is a true rags-to-riches story as far as poetry is concerned. However, rather than as an inspiring tale of perseverance, we should take Robinson’s singular career for what it is: a reminder that no matter how talented a poet is—and Robinson’s was a once-in-a-generation talent— often the only thing that separates a nationally adored, decorated poet from a nameless failure passed out drunk in the gutter is a freakish stroke of luck. 

            After Robinson effectively self-released his first two books, he was finally able, with the help of his friends, to get his third book legitimately published. It didn’t end up mattering much—the reception was lukewarm at best. Disappointed and depressed, Robinson gave up poetry for years and began to drink more heavily. At this point, there was absolutely no reason to suspect that he would ever be successful. His life, in all likelihood, would have ended in complete dissolution if it were not for a teenager by the name of Kermit.

            Kermit happened to be a student of one of Robinson’s friends, who had given him a copy of Robinson’s poems. He also happened to have the last name Roosevelt. Kermit, a chronic depressive, found sympathy and solace in Robinson’s dark view of the world, and quickly fell in love with his poetry. In 1904, he shared Robinson’s poems with his father, President of the United States Theodore Roosevelt. The elder Roosevelt swiftly became a fan as well, particularly of today’s poem. He himself took the time to write a review of Robinson’s work, commenting, “I am not sure I understand “Luke Havergal,” but I am entirely sure that I like it.” We may speculate then that it was this poem that launched Robinson’s career. Teddy Roosevelt gave Robinson a sinecure position at a customs house, got his poetry properly published, and essentially made him the unofficial poet laureate of the United States. 

            Now thoroughly established as a nationally beloved poet, Robinson’s career leapt into the stratosphere. In the next decade, he won the Pulitzer Prize a record three times: in 1922, 1925, and 1928, a record that has only ever been topped by his longer-lived contemporary, Robert Frost. Nowadays, when we think of American poetry in the 1920’s, we’re far more likely to think of extravagant high modernist figures like T.S. Eliot, Ezra Pound, William Carlos Williams, or Marianne Moore. If we were actually living in the 1920’s however, Robinson’s name and words would have been forefront in our consciousness. The fact that his work has been eclipsed in popularity by the modernists, and by Frost for that matter, is an enormous error of critical appraisal, like a smaller scale version of France’s centuries long dismissal of English drama, or England’s centuries long dismissal of French drama. Like Voltaire with Shakespeare, many modern readers of poetry are too artistically alienated, too culturally and psychologically distant from Robinson to fully appreciate him without critical guidance. I hope that this episode will help to aid, in its small way, the rejuvenation of Robinson’s reputation, and, with all due respect to the critical faculties of Teddy Roosevelt, help to elucidate this gorgeous, disturbing poem. 

            Like Robert Frost and Thomas Hardy, Robinson was a poet who straddled two worlds: late 19th century Victoriana and early 20th century Modernism. Like Frost and Hardy, his work reflects a negotiation between these two worlds: one the one hand, his formal technique is highly traditional, though with much experimentation within the traditional norm, and on the other hand, his subject matter is thoroughly modern, inspired more by contemporary realist novels than dreamy Victorian verse: gritty, working class characters and situations, themes of meaninglessness, unfulfillment, quiet suffering, and cosmic mystery, and an almost Henry Jamesian sensitivity to psychological complexity, subtlety, relationship dynamics, and interiority fill his work. Taken as a whole, his body of work makes Hardy look sentimental and Frost unsophisticated by comparison. It is a cruel joke of history that today he is known mostly for bleak, darkly humorous portraits like Richard Cory and Miniver Cheevy. These are fine poems, to be sure, but they mischaracterize Robinson as a kind of gimmicky one trick pony, when his talent is in fact so much vaster than that. Today’s poem is a case in point, but I also refer the reader to his longer works, such as the incredible dramatic monologue “Rembrandt to Rembrandt,” the achingly poignant story “Aunt Imogen,” and the beautiful, philosophically dense narrative poem “Lancelot.” 

            Today’s poem, “Luke Havergal,” was written by Robinson when he was younger than I am, but already here he demonstrates a profound mastery of both the music of poetry and the darkest struggles of the human soul. The poem goes like this:

Luke Havergal

Go to the western gate, Luke Havergal,

There where the vines cling crimson on the wall,

And in the twilight wait for what will come.

The leaves will whisper there of her, and some,

Like flying words, will strike you as they fall;

But go, and if you listen she will call.

Go to the western gate, Luke Havergal—

Luke Havergal.

No, there is not a dawn in eastern skies

To rift the fiery night that’s in your eyes;

But there, where western glooms are gathering,

The dark will end the dark, if anything:

God slays Himself with every leaf that flies,

And hell is more than half of paradise.

No, there is not a dawn in eastern skies—

In eastern skies.

Out of a grave I come to tell you this,

Out of a grave I come to quench the kiss

That flames upon your forehead with a glow

That blinds you to the way that you must go.

Yes, there is yet one way to where she is,

Bitter, but one that faith may never miss.

Out of a grave I come to tell you this—

To tell you this.

There is the western gate, Luke Havergal,

There are the crimson leaves upon the wall.

Go, for the winds are tearing them away,—

Nor think to riddle the dead words they say,

Nor any more to feel them as they fall;

But go, and if you trust her she will call.

There is the western gate, Luke Havergal—

Luke Havergal.

The music of this poem is a tour de force. In its eeriness, its obsessiveness, its echoing melody, it achieves what Edgar Allan Poe never could—a vague, mystical feeling of dread, without a trace of goofiness or melodrama. Yet the poem doesn’t work on atmosphere alone— it also traces a highly precise story, terrifying in its ramifications. 

Robinson has invented a form specifically for this poem, what is called a nonce form. This nonce form consists of four eight-line stanzas, what are called octaves or octets, that rhyme AABBAAAA, all in iambic pentameter except for the last line, which is in dimeter. The first line of each stanza is repeated in the seventh line, and its last two feet are repeated in the eighth line. This songlike repetition is reminiscent of medieval and Renaissance French forms like the rondel, the triolet, and the villanelle, and reading this poem we get the sense that Luke is being wooed by a troubadour-like voice. As in those forms, the repetitiveness not only of the line but of the rhyme scheme itself creates a sense of pining obsessiveness, and the echo effect created by the eighth dimeter line gives us the sense that we are listening to a disembodied voice resounding in the landscape, or perhaps merely in Luke’s own skull. 

Metrically, the poem is highly regular, which adds to the smoothness of its music. Because however there is also frequent rhythmic modulation, both through differently weighted iambs and through variously placed punctuation and caesuras, the rhythm doesn’t ever become monotonous. Robinson does make powerful use of first foot trochaic substitutions, nearly always in order to convey a tone of urgency. We see this particularly in the last stanza, where Robinson employs three first foot trochaic substitutions in a row: “There is the western gate, Luke Havergal. There are the crimson leaves upon the wall. Go, for the winds are tearing them away.” 

Let’s now go back and read the first stanza once more:

Go to the western gate, Luke Havergal,

There where the vines cling crimson on the wall,

And in the twilight wait for what will come.

The leaves will whisper there of her, and some,

Like flying words, will strike you as they fall;

But go, and if you listen she will call.

Go to the western gate, Luke Havergal—

Luke Havergal.

            It’s tricky to examine this stanza exactly line by line, because the meaning of some lines only becomes evident once you read the lines that follow. We may not initially know what the speaker means by the “western gate,” but in the third line, with the mention of twilight, we realize that we are talking about the place in the west where the sun sets and passes over the horizon. If we then look at line two, we read that on this figurative gate, “the vines hang crimson the wall.” In order to achieve the autumnal color of crimson, the vines must be dying; furthermore, the effect of redness is increased by the redness of the dying day. Once this association with death is made, we can put two and two together: figuratively speaking, the western gate is the gate of death, the place where the soul passes over and is extinguished, the place where our day ends, and the darkness comes. This is all the more appropriate when we consider that the name “Luke” means light. The speaker urges Luke to extinguish himself—to go the gates of death, and “in the twilight wait for what will come—” the night. 

If we go back and consider the freight of the word “crimson” the situation becomes even more dire—crimson originally comes from the Persian kermes, meaning worm-colored, and worms are a clear association with the grave. Furthermore, crimson is also the color most commonly used to describe the hue of blood, suggesting that to pass through the gates of death will require violent self-harm. If we picture crimson colored vines, we cannot help but see them as resembling veins or arteries—Luke must plunge through them to meet his death. 

In the next three lines, we get our first hint at why the mysterious voice is urging Luke to commit suicide: “the leaves will whisper there of her, and some, like flying words, will strike you as they fall.” Clearly Luke is being tempted to kill himself over a woman he loves. The symbolic significance of the leaves is somewhat mysterious, but the fact that they’re falling confirms the autumnal setting we have inferred, as well as the atmosphere of death which hangs over this figurative gate. At this point, if we had to guess, I think it would make sense to wager that the leaves are his memories of this woman— they whisper of her, and, like flying words, strike him as they fall. Given that these dead leaves are associated with the woman, we have reason to infer that the woman herself is dead, and that Luke’s suicidal thoughts are driven by grief. The leaves are the thoughts that haunt him, the thoughts which lead him to consider his own demise. 

Our idea that the woman is dead is confirmed in line six. Once at the gate, the voice says: “If you listen, she will call.” Presumably, the woman he loves is on the other side of the gate of death, calling for Luke to join her. The voice urges him again: “Go the western gate, Luke Havergal—Luke Havergal.” The voice itself is terrifyingly ambiguous: is it the voice of his own suicidal thoughts? Is it the voice of his dead lover? Is it the tempting voice of the devil, appropriately cloaked in red imagery? All of these are possible. 

Let’s now begin again, and read through the second stanza:

Go to the western gate, Luke Havergal,

There where the vines cling crimson on the wall,

And in the twilight wait for what will come.

The leaves will whisper there of her, and some,

Like flying words, will strike you as they fall;

But go, and if you listen she will call.

Go to the western gate, Luke Havergal—

Luke Havergal.

No, there is not a dawn in eastern skies

To rift the fiery night that’s in your eyes;

But there, where western glooms are gathering,

The dark will end the dark, if anything:

God slays Himself with every leaf that flies,

And hell is more than half of paradise.

No, there is not a dawn in eastern skies—

In eastern skies.

In between stanzas one and two, the text suggests that Luke has made an unrecorded attempt, either mental or verbal, to protest against the urgings of the murderous voice. He holds out hope of renewal, hope that his suffering will one day end. The voice comes back in to firmly correct him: “No, there is not a dawn in eastern skies/to rift the fiery night that’s in your eyes.” In other words: do not seek to live another day, do not seek to live beyond this night: for there will be no renewal, no shining dawn of hope or healing that can bring an end to your darkness, an end to the desire for death that’s in your eyes. This desperate desire for death is described paradoxically as a “fiery night,” illustrating both the passion of love which is the motive for his anguish, and the eternal darkness of death which is the goal. 

            This contradictory image of “fiery night,” as well as the assertion of utter hopelessness, can’t help but recall to us that famous passage from Book I of Paradise Lost, where Milton describes hell as: 

“A dungeon horrible, on all sides round
 As one great furnace flamed, yet from those flames
 No light, but rather darkness visible
 Served only to discover sights of woe,
 Regions of sorrow, doleful shades, where peace
 And rest can never dwell, hope never comes
 That comes to all;”

            In this light, suicidal thoughts come to be framed in terms of almost diabolical possession— a hellscape in the mind that leads to the hell-deserving sin of self-slaughter. The voice, however, frames death as a relief: “the dark will end the dark, if anything.” In other words, the eternal darkness of death is the only cure for the emotional darkness of life. 

            Speaking of hell, in the next line we discover that there is a theological debate occurring between Luke and the voice— as part of his case against killing himself, it seems that Luke had pointed out the fact that the Christian God forbids suicide, and that those who commit suicide are condemned to hell. The voice, in one of my favorite lines in all of literature, refutes this claim: “God slays himself with every leaf that flies.” This line can be read in at least two very interesting ways, both of which assume a position of Pantheism—the belief that God is Nature, God is everything. 

In the first and more metaphysical reading, we can read this line as claiming that God, a being that in itself is perfect unity and potentiality, slays itself through the process of creation by manifesting as individual, actualized objects. In this reading, “every leaf that flies” stands as in as an example for every object God creates, each of which involves God splitting itself into smaller constituents. In one of his greatest poems, “Sketch of A Serpent,” the French poet Paul Valery puts this very argument into the mouth of Satan. I quote from my own translation:

What vanity it was, First Cause!

He who reigns among the heavens,

with a word that was pure light,

unleashed the spatial universe: 

Bored by constant purity,

He shattered with impunity

His own perfect eternity—

And so, scattered His Principle 

into the planets and the stars,

and ruined His unity. 

            Through the very act of creation, the act of becoming the multiplicity of Nature, the voice says, God Himself has committed suicide, and therefore cannot disapprove of it. 

            The second way we can read this line has to do more specifically with the fact that we’re talking about dead leaves. If God is everything, then every time something dies, God is dying too. Of course, because nothing can happen except according to God’s own will, this means that, with every leaf that flies, God is killing Himself. Living things are engineered to die, and die all the time—if God is or is in all things, this means that God is deliberately killing Himself, constantly. Such a God, the voice implies, cannot possibly view suicide as an evil. 

Moreover, what the voice doesn’t say explicitly, but what we can infer, is that even if we dismiss Pantheism and adhere closely to orthodox Christian doctrine, we are still left with the fact that God sacrificed Himself in the form of Jesus Christ— Jesus is God, therefore, God killed Himself. It would be hypocritical of such a suicidal God to condemn suicide. This may be a sophistical argument worthy of a demon, but it is an intriguing one. 

In connecting the falling of leaves to the prospect of suicide and hell, we can’t help but find more fascinating allusions, this time to Dante. In Canto XIII of the Inferno, Dante and Virgil encounter the souls of those who have been condemned to Hell for committing suicide. In a classic instance of Dante’s contra passo, inventing a punishment that fits the crime, because the suicides threw their bodies away in life, in death they must exist imprisoned within the bodies of trees instead, their leaves forever torn and feasted upon by vicious harpies. The arboreal imagery in Robinson’s poem, so intimately entwined with the idea of suicide, adds a connotation of Dantesque damnation to the already foreboding, autumnal atmosphere of the poem. I would also be remiss not to mention Dante’s famous leaf simile in canto III of Inferno, borrowed, like his bleeding tree imagery, from Virgil, which is used to describe all the damned souls who cross the river Acheron to enter into Hell proper. In Allen Mandelbaum’s translation:

“As, in the autumn, leaves detach themselves,
 first one and then the other, till the bough
 sees all its fallen garments on the ground,

similarly, the evil seed of Adam
 descended from the shoreline one by one.”

            Here we have not only the same autumnal imagery as in Robinson’s poem, but the same liminal space between life and eternal damnation. Just as the gate over Dante’s Hell is inscribed: “Abandon all hope, ye who enter here,” so too does the voice tell Luke to give up all hope, and enter the gate— no, there is not a dawn in eastern skies. 

The voice does offer one mysterious consolation: Even if to commit suicide is to go to hell, “hell is more than half of paradise.” I’m not exactly sure how best to read this, but I can think of three interpretations: the first is that, even if Luke does go to Hell, at least he will see his beloved there, and that in itself is an almost heavenly reward. If we go by this reading, we are probably assuming that Luke’s beloved also committed suicide, and that explains both why she is in Hell and why she is calling for him to join her. The second, related interpretation is that any respite from the suffering in life that he’s experiencing would seem like paradise by comparison. Finally, we can interpret this with a sort of moralizing, Felix Culpa mentality, an assertion that you can only understand Paradise if you have a Hell to compare it to. 

            Let’s now begin again, and this time, read all the way through the last two stanzas: 

Go to the western gate, Luke Havergal,

There where the vines cling crimson on the wall,

And in the twilight wait for what will come.

The leaves will whisper there of her, and some,

Like flying words, will strike you as they fall;

But go, and if you listen she will call.

Go to the western gate, Luke Havergal—

Luke Havergal.

No, there is not a dawn in eastern skies

To rift the fiery night that’s in your eyes;

But there, where western glooms are gathering,

The dark will end the dark, if anything:

God slays Himself with every leaf that flies,

And hell is more than half of paradise.

No, there is not a dawn in eastern skies—

In eastern skies.

Out of a grave I come to tell you this,

Out of a grave I come to quench the kiss

That flames upon your forehead with a glow

That blinds you to the way that you must go.

Yes, there is yet one way to where she is,

Bitter, but one that faith may never miss.

Out of a grave I come to tell you this—

To tell you this.

There is the western gate, Luke Havergal,

There are the crimson leaves upon the wall.

Go, for the winds are tearing them away,—

Nor think to riddle the dead words they say,

Nor any more to feel them as they fall;

But go, and if you trust her she will call.

There is the western gate, Luke Havergal—

Luke Havergal.

            In the third stanza, we get a big reveal that confirms our suspicions: we now have solid foundations to believe that the speaker is the voice of the dead beloved, whether heard literally as a ghost or as a borderline schizophrenic disturbance in Luke’s mind. We know the voice comes from beyond the grave, and we know it has come to “quench the kiss that flames upon your forehead with a glow that blinds you to the way that you must go.” This language of kissing strongly implies the voice of the lover: It is her own kiss which will quench and extinguish the bright, glowing kiss of life to which Luke is clinging, a flame which, in its brilliance, “blinds him to the way that he must go,” that is, to join her in the grave. Her ghost has come to extinguish the light which is Luke himself. Though Robinson almost certainly didn’t have this in mind, I can’t help but be reminded of the conception of the golem in Jewish mythology, a man made of clay who lives or dies depending on the Hebrew letters added or removed from his forehead. 

The demon lover insists: “there is but one way to where she is, bitter, but one that faith may never miss.” With the use of the word “bitter,” Robinson has given us the decisive clue to understanding the second half of our protagonist’s name: the word “gall” literally refers to bile, as in the word gallbladder. More generally, it has come to refer to anything that is bitter. Luke is a haver of gall, someone who carries bitterness around with him, and must follow a bitter way. If we go back to the literal meaning of gall, we can think of Luke as someone who has a great deal of bile. According to the Galenic theory of humors, an excess of yellow bile leads to anger, what we would call being choleric; an excess of black bile leads to depression, what we would call being melancholic. Though Robinson doesn’t specify, it’s safe to assume that the primary anguish from which Luke suffers is melancholia, making his name a sort of oxymoron: He is Luke, light, but he is also the bearer of black bile which will lead him to the darkness of death.

We can also of course read the G-A-L as “gal” meaning girl. Luke “has-a-gal—” he is a gal haver— and it that very gal who is the source of the suicidal thoughts which threaten to extinguish his light. When this gal says that he must follow the way which is “bitter, but one that faith may never miss,” she is asking Luke to not only display his romantic faithfulness to her, but his religious faith— for her sake, he must risk damnation. She must become his religion, and he must become her martyr. 

The last stanza forms an ardent bookend with the first— we see the very same A-rhymes as in the first stanza, as well as the trochaic insistence I mentioned earlier, the parting volley of the voice urging Luke towards his doom. The voice warns him that his time is short—“Go, for the winds are tearing them away,” referring to the leaves. This strengthens our hypothesis that the leaves symbolize Luke’s painful memories of his beloved— if he waits too long, his memories will fade, or at the very least his pain will fade, and he will no longer have the resolve to join his beloved in death. Nor, the voice says, should he spend any time trying to “riddle the dead words they say.” In other words, he should stop questioning the legitimacy of his suicidal thoughts, and stop trying to rationalize the preservation of his life. We should also note that the word “leaves” can refer both to the leaves of trees and leaves of paper—hence the imagery of word on leaves is particularly apt, and may additionally refer to letters Luke has kept from his beloved. 

She says that he should no longer seek to feel the leaves as they fall—the time for grieving has ended, the time for resolution has come. In the sixth line of this last stanza, the voice modifies the sixth line of the first stanza. No longer must he merely listen for the call— Luke has shown that he has too much doubt to be so easily swayed. Instead, he must trust. He must have faith. Only then will his beloved call, return to him, leading him away with her through the gate, into the darkness of eternal night—a kind of Orpheus and Eurydice in reverse. 

Beyond its remarkable aesthetic beauty, what is the value of such a poem as this? Robinson himself doesn’t necessarily endorse suicide here, but he doesn’t seem to overtly disapprove of it either. If there is a moral substance to this poem, it lies in the fact that what Robinson has done, effectively and movingly, is demonstrate— with an impressive degree of artistic objectivity—how seductive suicidal thoughts can be to those who are emotionally vulnerable, and how a narrative of romantic heroism and faithfulness can build up in someone’s mind as a justification for such a tragic act. 

Through the sheer beauty of the poem, Robinson partly seduces us as well, drawing us in and giving us a sort of insider’s look at how such a mind works. However, because of the careful artistic distance that Robinson maintains, the distance between himself and his subject, his material and his own voice, this seductiveness is neither malicious nor intended to be persuasive, but is rather a way to expand our understanding of human psychology and increase our powers of empathy. In that sense, what initially appears to be a dangerously amoral poem turns out in fact to possess a humanistic, civilizing influence. Upon reflection, a poem like “Luke Havergal” is much more thoughtful and responsible on the issue of suicide than, say, Romeo and Juliet, or The Sorrows of Young Werther. It offers us the opportunity to stare dark forces in the face, recognize them, and name them for what they are. 

With all that we’ve learned and explored, let’s read through this poem one last time, as an old friend:

Luke Havergal

Go to the western gate, Luke Havergal,

There where the vines cling crimson on the wall,

And in the twilight wait for what will come.

The leaves will whisper there of her, and some,

Like flying words, will strike you as they fall;

But go, and if you listen she will call.

Go to the western gate, Luke Havergal—

Luke Havergal.

No, there is not a dawn in eastern skies

To rift the fiery night that’s in your eyes;

But there, where western glooms are gathering,

The dark will end the dark, if anything:

God slays Himself with every leaf that flies,

And hell is more than half of paradise.

No, there is not a dawn in eastern skies—

In eastern skies.

Out of a grave I come to tell you this,

Out of a grave I come to quench the kiss

That flames upon your forehead with a glow

That blinds you to the way that you must go.

Yes, there is yet one way to where she is,

Bitter, but one that faith may never miss.

Out of a grave I come to tell you this—

To tell you this.

There is the western gate, Luke Havergal,

There are the crimson leaves upon the wall.

Go, for the winds are tearing them away,—

Nor think to riddle the dead words they say,

Nor any more to feel them as they fall;

But go, and if you trust her she will call.

There is the western gate, Luke Havergal—

Luke Havergal.

You may be wondering—whatever happened to Kermit Roosevelt, the bright young teenager who discovered this poem, loved it, passed it on to his father, and thereby made Robinson the man that he became? When he grew up he became an accomplished explorer and career soldier. At the age of 53, stationed in Alaska, he could take the darkness of life no more, and put a bullet through his head.