The Lifeguard
James Dickey
5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 50 65 60 |
In a stable of boats I lie still, From all sleeping children hidden. The leap of a fish from its shadow Makes the whole lake instantly tremble. With my foot on the water, I feel The moon outside Take on the utmost of its power. I rise and go out through the boats. I set my broad sole upon silver, On the skin of the sky, on the moonlight, Stepping outward from earth onto water In quest of the miracle This village of children believed That I could perform as I dived For one who had sunk from my sight. I saw his cropped haircut go under. I leapt, and my steep body flashed Once, in the sun. Dark drew all the light from my eyes. Like a man who explores his death By the pull of his slow-moving shoulders, I hung head down in the cold, Wide-eyed, contained, and alone Among the weeds, And my fingertips turned into stone From clutching immovable blackness. Time after time I leapt upward Exploding in breath, and fell back From the change in the children’s faces At my defeat. Beneath them I swam to the boathouse With only my life in my arms To wait for the lake to shine back At the risen moon with such power That my steps on the light of the ripples Might be sustained. Beneath me is nothing but brightness Like the ghost of a snowfield in summer. As I move toward the center of the lake, Which is also the center of the moon, I am thinking of how I may be The savior of one Who has already died in my care. The dark trees fade from around me. The moon’s dust hovers together. I call softly out, and the child’s Voice answers through blinding water. Patiently, slowly, He rises, dilating to break The surface of stone with his forehead. He is one I do not remember Having ever seen in his life. The ground I stand on is trembling Upon his smile. I wash the black mud from my hands. On a light given off by the grave I kneel in the quick of the moon At the heart of a distant forest And hold in my arms a child Of water, water, water. |
Making Meanings
The Lifeguard
1. Write down one question you have about this poem.
2. Who is the speaker in “The Lifeguard”? Where is he, according to stanza 1? What are the children doing?
3. In stanza 2, what does the lifeguard do? What is he searching for?
4. According to the flashback in stanzas 3–6, what did the lifeguard do to try to save the boy that day? Why did he swim to the boathouse?
5. In stanza 7, we are back in the present. What is the lifeguard hoping to accomplish?
6. What does the lifeguard do in stanza 8? How do you interpret the events in lines 46–54?
7. One of the themes of the poem has to do with the miracle that the lifeguard hopes for: to save the boy. In developing that theme, Dickey makes allusions to two of Christ’s miracles: walking on water and bringing a dead man to life. Which lines of the poem allude to these miracles?