Paul Muldoon’s “Armageddon, Armageddon”: Turbulent Travels Through Armageddon, Armagh
Paul Muldoon’s “Armageddon, Armageddon” is a fittingly cryptic final poem to his second collection, Mules (1977). The poem is the longest in the collection, and consists of seven sonnet-like poems titled only with roman numerals. As stated by Muldoon in an interview with the Arch Literary Journal, the title is a play on the name of his hometown Armagh, and the poem is set in Northern Ireland. Muldoon doesn’t seem to make much of an effort to clue his reader into what he may be getting at with “Armageddon, Armageddon,” but he hints at a theme that is common in his writing: the unlikely combination of simple and grand things in single objects or events. Muldoon uses many allusions to relate back to his home of Northern Ireland. Nearly every other line in “Armageddon, Armageddon” makes references ranging from Irish, Greek, and Roman mythology, obscure poets, and scripture. While reading a poem so densely packed with allusions, the time it takes to investigate the references is worthwhile.
Muldoon first makes a reference to Ireland in the title of the poem. Armageddon is meant to be a play on the word Armagh, the county he was born in. By referencing his homeland in the title of the poem, Muldoon sets up the rest of the poem to be about travels through a violence-stricken Northern Ireland. Ireland was undergoing violent struggles over national unity and allegiance and Muldoon addresses the divisions with his allusions. The form of each poem is quite similar. They are each sonnets and use the occasional rhyme. Perhaps to fit into the mood suggested by the title of Armageddon, Muldoon never makes a rhyme scheme or rhythm last more than a few lines.
The first poem recounts a trip to Larry Durrell’s “Snow-White Villa.” The first eight lines of the poem all describe an actual Villa that the British poet Lawrence Durrell owned in Greece. Dualities are introduced to the poem with the mention of Durrell. He was an expatriate and was often divided between multiple homes. The question of duality continues with the line describing the villa, “Wasn’t it dazzling? Well, it was rather white.” The first half of the poem is seemingly cheerful, but the seventh line introduces doubt about the pleasant Grecian villa: “The orange and lemon groves, the olives, Are wicked for this purity of light.” The last half of the poem presents an unclear image with yet another allusion. The line “Her little breasts are sour as Jeanne Duval’s” refers to the French-African muse of the French poet Charles Baudelaire, but it is unclear who the “Her” is in the poem. The last sentence of the poem refers to the stars, which are of greater importance in the fifth poem where Muldoon references many different constellations.
The second selection in “Armageddon, Armageddon” is a retelling of a tale from Irish mythology about an ancient poet, bard, and warrior named Oisin. The myth says that Oisin returned to Ireland after three hundred years, and was told he would instantly become and old man and die if he dismounted his horse and stood on the earth. In the title poem of Mules, Muldoon uses the phrase “feet of clay.” This alludes to a hero ultimately being human and having their feet on the earth. This same imagery works with Oisin. He spent time with the Irish gods, but ultimately was human when his feet touched the earth. Just as he did in the first sonnet with Lawrence Durrel, Muldoon inserts duality by referencing a character split between two worlds. After describing Oisin’s death and return to the earth, the narrator says “And I know something of how he felt.” This is the most intriguing line of this selection. The narrator seems to be describing their connection to the earth that could be their ultimate downfall. Just as the famous Northern Irish poet Seamus Heaney felt pressure to write about his homeland, Muldoon could be feeling pressure to address the problems in his homeland, or “earth.” Neighbors were pit against each other based on which part, or “earth,” of Ireland they felt loyal to. The third poem delivers Muldoon’s contemporary view of Northern Ireland.
If we are to assume a connection between these poems, the third poem appears to be narrated by the same person as the first two. The narrator describe various activities in Northern Ireland starting with the mundane and moving to the more somber. Although the poem starts reassuringly, “Not to worry,” the mention of the Lambeg Drum turns the poem in a political direction “From where I lived / We might watch Long Bullets being played, / Follow the course of a pair of whippets, / Try to Keep in time with a Lambeg Drum.” The Lambeg Drum is associated with and used by the Irish Orange Order, and the next stanza describes how the Orange Order has taken up residence in the towns the narrator could visit. The last five lines of the poem each make reference to some external event or myth. The narrator says “We could always go closer if you wanted,” and then goes on to reference Macha (an Irish mythological figure that is associated with war and who raced a chariot), the intelligent horse creatures from Jonathan Swift’s Gulliver’s Travels, Macha’s twins that she “whelped” after her chariot race, a train disaster in Armagh, and a planetarium in Armagh. While it’s possible to get lost in the cluttering of allusions Muldoon supplies, he seems to be saying that the mythological figures and other references are closer to home in Ireland than the Orange Order and their beating drums. The myths are the Irish heritage. By mentioning an Irish train disaster and asking why one shouldn’t visit the new planetarium, Muldoon could be saying the Orange Order is trivial and the Irish should settle their differences and focus on bettering the country.
The fourth poem is addressed to the narrator’s lover who has been sleeping. The sleeping lover was hoping for the chance to dream “I woke you only to discover / How you might have dreamed / How you might have dreamed.” The Armageddon is certainly a time when pleasant dreams would be hard to come by, and the sleeping lover experiences this. The poem continues with a train inspector hinting about a blockade on the track because of fallen trees. Muldoon again references the stars with the last two lines “And then hand back our tickets / Ratified by their constellations?” The tickets would be the passenger’s destinations, and if they’re ratified by their constellations, then their destinations are already decided. This allusion to a set fate would fit into the approaching Armageddon.
The fifth poem takes off where the fourth poem left off, “Now that I had some idea of our whereabouts / We could slow a little and not be afraid.” This poem seems to be situated in an apocalyptic time. Phrases such as “Why should those women be carrying water / If all the wells were poisoned, as they said,” and “Had the sheep been divided from the goats,” suggest the supplies have run out, and a final judgment is nearing. The last stanza references two different constellations, Orion and Sagittarius, the Hunter and the Archer. According to Greek Mythology Orion was made into a constellation upon his death, and the last lines seem to suggest even Orion and Sagittarius have left the earth, “Had Hunter and Archer got it into their heads / That they would take the stars in their strides?” After dealing with the cosmic, Muldoon returns to his local home of Ireland in the sixth poem.
The mood of the sixth poem is rather dismal. The narrator’s brother lost his voice after their father lost his money at the racetracks. Muldoon hints the problem is greater than merely losing money, “To be torn between his own two ponies / Their going their different ways.” The father has two interests “investments, or focuses in his life” and the investments have gone different ways. The mother is “bent-double” over the kitchen sink after breaking one of her best dishes and the narrator says “We would bury her when we were able.” The home appears to be completely torn apart. The fourth to last line, “Some violence had been done to Grace,” appears to have dual meaning. Grace could be the name of the narrator’s sister because “She had left for our next-of-kin” in the next line, but Muldoon is never as simple as that. A violence appears to have been done to the Grace of God. God’s favor has been lost and the Armageddon approaches. The last line has the brother “warning of bayonets fixed in the bushes.” Surely the end approaches.
The last poem is given a setting right from the start, “A summer night in Keenaghan.” The end has arrived and the darkness is absolute, “So dark my light had lingered near its lamp For fear of it.” The narrator takes a kettle to a stream, and breathes through a hollow reed. “Armageddon, Armageddon” fittingly ends with one last allusion. A black beetle crawls on the underside of the narrator’s hand, and he must turn it around “To have it walk in the paths of uprightness.” This is a line from Proverbs 2, a passage that addresses eternal salvation and damnation, “For the upright live in the land And the blameless will remain in it; But the wicked will be cut off from the land And the treacherous will be uprooted from it.” It seems Muldoon is making one last commentary on the affairs of Ireland. He hopes that more people will “walk in the paths of uprightness” so that they aren’t “cut off from the land.”
“Armageddon, Armageddon” is a puzzling adventure through Northern Ireland and ancient mythology. In an arguably excessive way, Muldoon fills each of his lines with numerous obscure references and allusions. After working through the many allusions, one can see that Muldoon is reflecting on the treacherous state of affairs in Ireland at the time he wrote his poem. Muldoon highlights Ireland’s rich history and accomplishments in the face of the turmoil caused by the political divisions when he wrote his poem. Northern Ireland’s factions and own dualities were well paralleled and illustrated by Muldoon’s extensive inclusion of dualities throughout “Armageddon, Armageddon,” and Mules as a whole.
Works Cited
Muldoon, Paul. “Paul Muldoon and the Multiverse.” Arch Literary Journal (2008). Web.
13 Feb. 2011.
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