Abstract
Randolph Healy's 1997 poem ‘Arbor Vitae’ connects formally experimental poetry with an Irish tradition of politically engaged literature. Eschewing questions of national boundaries or authenticity, Healy instead develops a poetics and ethics of intersection. His apparently depersonalized poem is composed of essayistic fragments that address the role of the deaf in Irish society. This essay argues that Healy's formal choices refuse the oral basis of the lyric, and instead align his poem with nonverbal forms of communication. This challenge to the authenticity of speech also questions the language policies of the Republic of Ireland and reveals the role of the state in disciplining citizens, particularly through education. In addition to the accumulation of disparate pieces in the poem, Healy's formal innovation continues in the poem's paratextual apparatus, contributing to his development of an alternative to the epic and the lyric. As Healy incorporates references to the material basis for all communication in this poem, he establishes the lived body as key to connecting the hearing with the deaf. By fracturing poetic expectations in ‘Arbor Vitae’, Healy reconnects language deeply to the material and social world of contemporary Ireland, offering a path for conceptual poetry to be also a public and political poetry.
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