The poet sits at his desk and contemplates all that he’s accomplished: James Tate's perfect goodbye poem

Posted Saturday morning, July 13, 2019.

The late poet James Tate at his home in Pelham, Massachusetts in 2011. Photo courtesy of the Christian Science Monitor, via the Guardian.

The poet James Tate died four years ago this month.James Tate died four years ago this month. He just published his final book of poems. “The Government Lake”. Well, his publisher published it for him. Here is the last poem in the book. The last poem he wrote. It was found in is typewriter after he died. It’s a funny poem, and a happy poem. I think it’s the perfect goodbye poem, partly because it is so happy. Tate didn’t have a chance to give it a title. Untitled poems are traditionally titled “Untitled” or called by their first line. The Paris Review, which published it in its Spring 2016 issue, chose to go with “Untitled”  The editors of “The Government Lake” went with the first line option and that’s how it appears in the table of contents: “I sat at my desk and contemplated all that I had accomplished”...

  I sat at my desk and contemplated all that I had accomplished
this year. I had won the hot dog eating contest on Rhode Island.
No, I hadn’t. I was just kidding. I was the arm wrestling champion
in Portland, Maine. False. I caught the largest boa constrictor
in Southern Brazil. In my dreams. I built the largest house
out of matchsticks in all the United States. Wow! I caught
a wolf by its tail. Yumee. I married the Princess of Monaco.
Can you believe it? I fell off of Mount Everest. Ouch! I walked
back up again. It was tiring. Snore. I set a record for sitting
in my chair and snoring longer than anybody. Awake! I set a record
for swimming from one end of my bath to the other in No Count, 
Nebraska. Blurb. I read a book written by a dove. Great! I slept
in my chair all day and all night for thirty days. Whew! I ate
a cheeseburger every day for a year. I never want to do that again.
A trout bit me when I was washing the dishes. But I couldn’t catch
him. I flew over my hometown and didn’t recognize anyone. That’s
how long it’s been. A policeman stopped me on the street and said
he was sorry. He was looking for someone who looked just like
me and had the same name. What are the chances?

--- “I sat at my desk and contemplated all that I had accomplished” by James Tate collected in “The Government Lake: Last Poems”.