"When Poverty Comes Through The Door, Love Flies Up The Chimney."

John Montague's poem The Locket tells the heartbreaking story of his (or the speaker's) relationship with his mother. It starts off with "Sing a last song/for the lady who has gone," so we are aware right away that this "lady" has died. After the first three lines, I thought perhaps it was going to be about a relationship with his lover, who died during child birth. Instead, it's about this very complicated relationship with his mother, Molly. We find out she had always wanted a girl and instead had a boy, and she never forgave him for both being "the wrong sex" and coming out "the wrong way around." 

The tone of this poem is very melancholy and bleak, and I think the setting of Brooklyn has something to do with that. Although the place is never explicitly described in detail, we know that they are living in poverty, and as a result, Molly gives her son away.  There seems to be this distinction again from the home land of Ireland, where everything revolves around family, and once they have to settle in Brooklyn, there's a sense of helplessness, and the need for money is more powerful than the strength of love. The quote that defines Molly's character, and this story, is that "When poverty comes through the door, love flies up the chimney." I love that Montague gave us that glimpse into Molly's thoughts--it's a harsh and cold thought, but it's a reaction to a hopeless situation, and while some subscribe to the logic of "love conquers everything," Montague confronts us, though Molly, with the counter-argument: what if it can't? 

The second half of the poem talks about how he seeks out his mother so that she would know him, despite her desire not to. He uses the simile of "courting you like a young man, teasingly untying your apron," which shows a son trying to reconnect with her, despite her neglect of him. He finds out about her "wild young days" and I assumed she grew up in Ireland. He referred to her as "the belle of your small town," which for me represents the power and contentment she felt at home. I see her home and Brooklyn as disparate worlds. We see words like "cocoon of pain" and "constant rain" which I think apply to her current life, and the misery she feels in such poor conditions with such little money, and a son who both added to the expenses and wasn't what she wanted. 

I love how Montague again uses dialogue to show how she tells her son to not come around, because "I start to get fond of you and then you are gone." He describes her voice as "rough," and yet when he says she is "resigned to being alone," I think all readers feel a twinge of sympathy for her. We don't know the specifics of what happened in her past and why she had to leave her home and live in Brooklyn, but we know she has made the choice to be alone becaus she has no other choice.

The last stanza is heartbreaking, and so subtle. He calls her a "Mysterious blessing," I think the fact that the poem is using 2nd person and therefore referring directly to her is even more powerful. Somehow a reader is able to feel even more impacted by the words than if it were in third person, and it read "I never knew until she was gone that always around her neck she wore an oval locket..." The poem being addressed to his mother directly strengthens the deep sense of emotion and longing attached to it. I think one of the most beautiful parts of the poem is that last stanza, and specifically the last 3 lines, that, even without much specific description or detail, I still finish the poem with a distinct visual of exactly what that locket looks like. I finish the poem and in my head I see a half open oval locket, where I can peek in and see a grainy black and white photo of a young child. I think I use the term 'peeking in' because that's what most of this poem is. It's a small glimpse into a life that is so much more complex than seven stanzas could express, and yet even through a small glimpse, I as a reader feel all kinds of different emotions for Molly and her neglected but always loved, son.