Dahmer's murders are an extension of his desire to be joined forever with his beloveds. For Gunn, distance is a necessary condition for sustaining love. It begins at evening. The bottom of the sink has filled with sand, like the bottom of an hourglass, and no longer reflects his face. The beloved is both the force that keeps Gunn grounded in happiness and the ground against which he needs to picture himself.
Love endures even as romance fades.
If we wonder why so few people gush over Thom Gunn, we may need to look no further than this antisentimental eroticism, his unwillingness, even in his love poems, to indulge the reader in the fantasies that are the currency of popular appeal. But that may be all he's after. David Bergman is professor of English and director of the Cultural Studies Program at Towson University. All rights reserved.