Eurydice

Vuong wrote the free verse poem "Eurydice" in the lyric style. Free verse possesses no guidelines, unlike other forms. It allows poets to write without worrying about fitting their ideas into a specific rhyme and rhythmic scheme. Lyric poetry focuses on the writer's emotions and outlook. While containing narrative moments, lyric poems mostly forgo a linear story with a beginning, middle, and end. Because "Eurydice" suggests its events rather than directly telling the reader, the reader focuses on the speaker's reactions, recollections, emotions, and epiphanies. Vuong drops the reader into an event that’s already in process, beginning with an unidentified “It’s.” The speaker says it is "not / about the light—but how dark / it makes you" (Lines 12-14). The poem suggests that it does not matter what one knows. What matter is what one feels and experiences.

"Eurydice" unfolds over a single long stanza of 36 lines. For reference, a stanza is a group of lines. Poets create multiple stanzas by ending one stanza, adding space, and starting another. The poem's cast includes the speaker, their companion, gravity, a “him,” perhaps the companion, and a doe. The poem's title references Eurydice, a doomed lover from Greek mythology. Therefore, the speaker and companion are likely a romantic couple. At the end of the poem, the couple encounters a doe. The final lines evoke the myth of Eurydice and Orpheus, the doomed lovers. In the original myth, Orpheus seeks out Eurydice in the underworld, calling for her. An unidentified “him”—perhaps the companion—calls out to the doe, like Orpheus. The death of the doe may be a symbol of the death of the speaker and their companion’s relationship.

The speaker stays unnamed. Within the context of Night Sky with Exit Wounds, the speaker of "Eurydice" is likely a persona of Vuong. In interviews, Vuong describes the book as a mixture of autobiography and mythologizing. The poem's events arguably represent his collective anxieties and experiences as a gay man rather than depicting a singular actual incident. This interpretation fits within the lyric poetry mode, which centers emotion over plot. The poem shows the speaker talking with their partner, referred to as "you" (Line 13) about their memory of the traumatic journey.

The speaker and their companion embark on a journey and encounter danger. The poem establishes danger by beginning with a deer's death cry. The speaker’s use of an arrowhead implies that a hunter killed the deer. When the doe dies, the speaker does not show the arrowhead hitting the deer. Instead, they say the deer makes the sound "when the arrowhead / replaces the day" (Lines 3-4). The arrowhead becomes the dusk, moon, or night that "replaces" (Line 4) daylight. The poem teaches the reader to see dusk, that transitional period, as a threat. The speaker hammers this in by saying that the travelers foresaw “it” (Line 7), it being the natural order of time and violence.

The speaker and their companion continue walking, despite their insight. The poem conjures sunsets and dusk, leading the reader to connect images changing in shadows with the setting sun. The speaker says they and their companion continue "because the leaves were bright green / & the fire / only a pink brushstroke" (Lines 9-11). They may decide to walk on because they think they have more daylight hours ahead. In other words, they don’t think they are in danger.

The speaker reflects on how easily location, or circumstance, changes how someone appears. Their thoughts return to the dying deer, remarking that their lover's name sometimes reminds them of a deer corpse. The threat of danger still lurks in the speaker’s mind. However, the speaker does not reveal if awareness of this threat occurred as they traveled or only in the aftermath. However, they reveal that their partner's name definitively changed after gravity intruded on their walk.

At first, gravity seems gentle; it "touched" (Line 19) the lover's name. However, this gentleness falls away when gravity breaks the speaker and lover’s knees. Gravity's attack forces the speaker and lover to the ground. Gravity wants them to look up at the sky. Gravity compels the speaker and their companion to have a particular perspective. It forces them to look away from where they want to go and toward a place that potentially represents danger. Through a cultural-biographical lens, gravity symbolizes people who want everyone to be heterosexual, who will hurt LGBTQ+ people until they conform.

Despite looking up, they will never have the same experiences or views as heterosexuals. When they look up, they do not see the sky, but birds. Heterosexuality is not the default. They are gay men and can never become heterosexual. Despite seeing the birds, they lie to gravity about what they see. Although the speaker wonders, "why did we / keep saying Yes," the reader knows they say yes to survive and prevent violence (Lines 22-23).

In the aftermath, the speaker tells their partner that their worldview shifted significantly. The poem's tone moves from somber recollection to a lament. The speaker worries that no one will believe them, that their voice carries no power. Gravity’s attack made them realize the body's extreme vulnerability toward violence. Their need for physical safety now outweighs their need for love. The attack creates an emotional rift between the speaker and their lover.

The speaker ends the poem by evoking Orpheus and Eurydice. The “him” calls for “the girl” (Line 33) and yet the doe stands beside him. The disconnect in communication signals the breakdown of companionship and intimacy in the speaker’s relationship. In the myth of Eurydice and Orpheus, the lovers become permanently separated. The poem hints that the relationship that once made the speaker feel safe and move forward no longer works. Despite the speaker’s attempts to communicate their feelings to their partner through this poem, the speaker worries that it will not be enough to repair their bond.