POETRY REVIEW D H LAWRENCE THE AMERICAN EAGLE

Lawrence’s last poem to get into print before his death in 1930 is a stark, savage, uncompromising attack on US Republican politics and monopolistic capitalism.

Born cuckoo-like from a loving dove (Britain?), that is too doting and affectionate to cast out the changeling, the Dove watches helplessly as the Eagle destroys the rest of the eagles, exploiting any weakness it finds, such as having two heads (multiple party rule), or no head at all (anarcho-Communists), until it is the only eagle left.

The eagle rips out its own feathers (turns on its own citizens), and fills its mouth with everything it can consume until it looks like an eagle crossed with a pelican.

The gentle cooing taught to it by its ever-affectionate mother dove turns into a shrill squawking noise.

Patriots over-venerate their national symbol as patriotism gives way to nationalistic fervour and intolerance, and Lawrence concludes by comparing the Eagle to a fairy tale goose, laying Golden eggs, or at least struggling to lay the same golden egg for all time – an egg that is really rotten. The Americans seem trapped in a vision of a state of prosperity never to be attained.  Too Lawrence, writing after the Wall Street Crash, America has its dream, but that is a nightmare the country can never wake up and escape.

It’s a breath-taking note of bitterness for Lawrence to finish his poetry career upon.

Arthur Chappell