Donald Hall’s poem “Safe Sex” illustrates the danger that lurks behind closed doors even when every precaution has been taken to ensure that no one gets hurt. Hall’s poem balances on a shaky fulcrum of unrepentant insight.
Poetic Parallelism
The poem embraces the unknown which parallels aspects of casual sex. The first line asserts that “If he and she do not know each other, and feel confident / they will not meet again” (lines 1-2), and the answer is suspended building suspense. Also the enjambment of the first line brings a current of uncertainty that tows the poem towards unchecked tension. Line 1 ends with “confident”, but the confidence might be mistaken for a confidence in each other when it is actually confidence in confidentiality.
Unloving Litany
Semicolons string together a litany of ways for both “he and she” to stay out of trouble when it comes to casual intercourse:
if he avoids affectionate words;
if she has grown insensible skin under skin; if they desire
only the tribute of another’s cry; if they employ each other
as revenge on old lovers or families of entitlement and steel—(lines 2-5).
Hall creates a collage of avoidance and an acceptance of oppositions. The verb “desire” that is intrinsically tied to passionate love-making is pitted against the verb “employ” a word that connotes professional, not personal. The subtle juxtaposition of these two words further builds suspense giving romantics reasons to cheer and jeer while guzzling down a shot of reality.
Actions Have Consequences
The litany of “he said, she said” gives way to consequences arising from “Safe Sex” each consequence is bookmarked negatively with “no”:
there will be no betrayals, no letters returned unread,
no frenzy, no hurled words of permanent humiliation,
no trembling days, no vomit at midnight (lines 6-8).
“Betrayals” and “hurled words” make for bad bedfellows, and avoiding the loss of one’s dignity, “permanent humiliation”, or “vomit at midnight” may be viewed as a positive effect, but the effect stands on shaky ground. The poem centers on a teeter totter of emotion with right and wrong becoming skewed.
Form and Function
The form of the poem mimics the content and meaning of the work. The poem consists of four pairs of lines with a ninth line standing alone. Throughout the work Hall plays with “he” and “she” and then toys briefly with “they” almost like men and women toying with each other precoitus, followed by union. Next, there is a series of “no’s” that bolster the idea of what will not happen if the proper “precautions” are taken to avoid having any depth of feeling or thought. Superficiality is the key to remaining aloof and out of love, but is being shallow a safe move?
Sweet Release?
The first eight lines of the poem illustrate the duality of emotions and consequences, but the suspense unloads when the distant lovers visualize “no repeated / apparition of a body floating face-down at the pond’s edge” (lines 8-9). The image of an image of a ghost that was a lover haunts the reader and the suspense is released like the tension of knowing that the sex was “safe”. The realization of the suspense at the end of the poem is synonymous with sexual climax, but the image is haunting, dark, cold, and unforgiving like mistakes that cannot be undone.
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