deeply present...

from my anthology of must read (a)merican poems

Sharon Olds

His Costume

Somehow I never stopped to notice
that my father liked to dress as a woman.
He had his sign language about women
talking too much, and being stupid,
but whenever there was a costume party
he would dress like us, the tennis balls
for breasts—balls for breasts—the long
blond wig, the lipstick, he would sway
his body with moves of gracefulness
as if one being could be the whole
universe, its ends curving back to come
up from behind it. Six feet, and maybe
one-eighty, one-ninety, he had the shapely
legs of a male Grable—in short
skirt, he leaned against a bookcase pillar
nursing his fifth drink, gazing
around from inside his mascara purdah
with those salty eyes. The woman from next door
had a tail and ears, she was covered in Reynolds Wrap,
she was Kitty Foyle, and my mother was in
a tiny tuxedo, but he always won
the prize. Those nights, he had a look of daring,
a look of triumph, of having stolen
back. And as far as I knew, he never threw
up, as a woman, or passed out, or made
those signals of scorn with his hands, just leaned,
voluptuous, at ease, deeply
present, as if sensing his full potential, crossing
over into himself, and back,
over, and back.

*

From Satan Says to The Gold Cell to The Unswept Room, I’ve been enriched by the poetry of Sharon Olds. Her language and tone are inviting, direct, exposed. After reading an Olds’ poem, I have no doubts about her intention, theme, or content. The father, as a significant image and subject, surfaces in much of her writing.

What is most pleasing about “His Costume” is the speaker’s empathy for the father. In the harsh and conscious world of reality, he is cruel and out of balance – and I’ll add ... not willing to understand the self. Note “sign language,” “being stupid,” and “scorn”. But, these references do not define his true nature or charcter. When he moves outside or breaks free of the world he has made, he finds a settled place for his motions, for his acceptance – a place that has always existed:

                            he had a look of daring,
a look of triumph, of having stolen
back.

The father is, as a sign of hope, able to steal back all that has been lost. On those occasions, his intoxication becomes a different sort. As a woman, he finds a constructive order to his living, characterized, not by power or cruelty, but by certainty and acceptance. He leans… “voluptuous, at ease, deeply / present”.

Throughout the poem Olds uses enjambment to illustrate, in a physical way, the break the character has with an old, destructive, and expected way of living. “Crossing / over” a definite line of resistance and fear, the father finds a way of possibility. And, for a time, he is able to stand – or the wonderful image: lean – in a different way, in a different world. Olds’ ending the poem with the word back – showing the reader that the ease is short-lived and not sustainable for the father – adds a gentle sadness to his character.

A beautifully written poem about potential, about finding the deepest part of self, about acceptance – not tearing down, but leaning into.