As a novice in poetry, I am easily impressed. I knew these are famous poems that people have analyzed, praised, and been deeply moved by.
And I will join them.
Autumn Begins In Martins Ferry, Ohio
In the Shreve High football stadium, I think of Polacks nursing long beers in Tiltonsville, And gray faces of Negroes in the blast furnace at Benwood, And the ruptured night watchman of Wheeling Steel, Dreaming of heroes. All the proud fathers are ashamed to go home. Their women cluck like starved pullets, Dying for love. Therefore, Their sons grow suicidally beautiful At the beginning of October, And gallop terribly against each other's bodies.
James Wright
Americans then, probably still now, went to sport events to escape from their lives, their miserable and hopeless lives. They have dreams and they see those dreams in their sons who play high-school football. High school is pretty much the end of their formal education. The allure of those dreams even kept them away from their wives.
James Wright impressed those hopeless lives on my heart that I cannot shake off for days. I re-read this poem many times. The power of the words pounds on me. The last 4 lines grew in weight every time I read them. That “therefore” became a trapdoor to sink a deeper and deeper sadness.
What a master poet.