ODE ON MELANCHOLY:
SO WHAT?

So, here is a poem that many people have proclaimed over the past two hundred years to be one of the best poems ever written. Really. And, in the opposite corner, there’s you, thinking of how much science and witchcraft and whatever you would have to study to create an actual, working time machine, so you could go back to 1819 and punch the author, John Keats, in the face.

It’s not like he isn’t asking for it. This poem isn’t difficult because you are illiterate, it’s difficult because Keats made it difficult. He may not have invented the “I can’t understand this poem, so it must be good” school of literary criticism, but he’s certainly the king of it. Any abuse you care to heap on him would be good, earned abuse.

“Melancholy,” the subject of this poem, is like what we call “depression.” But while we think of depression as a crippling disease that can be treated with medicine, Keats, and artsy types like him, seem to have kind of liked it. Melancholy showed that they were sensitive. A depressed person might be a prisoner in their own home, unable to face the world outside because of inconsistent, uncaused terror, while a melancholy person unhappily wishes things were better but is secretly happy enough to brag about their condition  in a poem, showing that they understand how, for example, a bit of shell in an omelet is a sign, which the squares just ignore, that the world is imperfect.

What John Keats is saying in “Ode on Melancholy” is that sad people shouldn’t kill themselves, because everything, even things that seem wonderful, has a bit of awfulness in it too.

This poem certainly can live up to that theory. The twisted sentences, the inability to stay on subject, and, most of all, the goddamn cutie-pie references to Greek myths, all unnecessary and most strained, don’t make readers think “Ahh, here’s someone who gets it!” Most people finish this poem and think, “What is this guy’s problem?”

Start with Lethe, in the first line. She’s the goddess of the river of oblivion. That’s in hell, or, really, just the underworld, where you go when you die—the ancient Greeks were naïve about the realities of devils with pitchforks and flames and all that modern science has so clearly outlined for us. So, no, no, no, don’t die. Suffering catfish! that might make you oblivious to your troubles.  Why would a depressed person want that?

To emphasize the point about not committing suicide, the poem goes through a list of ways you could, even though you shouldn’t. Prosperpine isn’t what you think—a porcupine that has been prosperous—but is actually the Greek myth lady who was brought back to life but who had to go back to hell a few months each year because she ate something, some pomegranate (ruby grape) seeds, while there. Few people know that this basic principle is still in effect today, which is why even the dumpier motels will toss a few individual boxes of Froot Loops and some cellophane-wrapped danishes on the check-in desk each morning for “continental breakfast.”

 Stanza one ends with Keats’ summary, that you shouldn’t kill yourself because that would drown the anguish of your soul. He was probably pretty proud of himself, thinking that suicidal people would never have thought of that unforeseeable consequence before. It takes a sensitive poet.

Well, if you were suicidal, though, Keats has some advice in stanza two that should cheer you up. Think of nice things, like flowers and green hills in April and seashores. If your girlfriend is as depressed as you are (odds are good), take her by the hands, look deeply into her eyes, and (jump to stanza 3) remember that she is going to die.  Yup, that’s right, they’re all doomed—the roses and the peonies and the grassy April hill. All doomed. So why kill yourself, and miss all this?

The last stanza doesn’t have those annoying Greek mythology people, but instead uses personifications of basic moods: Beauty, Joy, Pleasure and Delight all show up to show to tell the depressed people, “Hey, look at me, I’m screwed too!” As psycho as the whole thing is, though, Joy stands out as the most nonsense. Just whose lips does Joy have a hand on? “His?” The only male-ish character mentioned earlier is the “thy” who has a mistress—what, did the poem switch from “you” to “him”? Does Joy have his hand to his own lips? Maybe he’s blowing a kiss while he says goodbye—sounds mighty prissy, but then, bidding adieu is the prissy way of saying goodbye. Later in the poem, though, “he” is back—he’s the guy with the strong tongue that can burst Joy’s grape. I can’t understand what’s going on her, and I’m pretty sure I don’t want to (when you don’t make sense, you’re a babbling idiot, but when a literary giant like Keats doesn’t it’s called “delightful ambiguity”).

The main point is, even in the temple of Delight (oh, why don’t they give whorehouses swell names anymore?), Melancholy dwells. So, depression is everywhere. So don’t kill yourself, got it?

It sounded smarter when John Keats oded it. Everything does—write an Ode to Dog Crap, throw in some Greek mythological figures—maybe the god of the messy yard and the goddess who could only smell things when the wind is from the east—and there will be a sizable crowd of readers lined up to step in it.