Atlantis: Poems by Book

A brave candling theory
I'm making for you,
little lamplight; believe,

and ripple out free
as shimmer is. Go.
Don't go. Go.

I'm not sure anyone writes about death better than Mark Doty does, but I'm not sure anyone writes about life better than Mark Doty does, either. Atlantis is the poetry collection that deals the most directly with the death of his partner, Wally, from AIDS, but when I think about it ten days after finishing it, I see a riot of colors and textures: brightly hued half-submerged boats in the harbor; vivid shades of nature, of sea and sky, of textiles and precious gems and metals. The animals are lively and life-giving; the men stop living when they die, but not a moment sooner than that. The connections Doty draws among all of these things are rapturous and deeply felt, and as a reader, you feel profoundly sad, but also profoundly grateful to be alive.