Deconstruction by Mary Ruefle

Deconstruction
by Mary Ruefle

I think the sirens in The Odyssey sang The Odyssey,
for there is nothing more seductive, more terrible,
than the story of our own life, the one we do not
want to hear and will do anything to listen to.

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I love the idea of the push and pull of the story of our own life, the one we must live our way into however hard. This goes along with Cavafy’s Ithaka in some ways. I don’t know much about this poet as I find myself currently new to her work. She’s American and born in 1952, Pulitzer finalist, MacArthur-adjacent, served as Vermont Poet Laureate. But her tuning into what the sirens made so compelling, because they know that that we are most undone by hearing what we have lived.