The poet John Hollander has died at 83. He wrote one of my favorite poems, Hobbes, 1651:
When I returned at last from Paris hoofbeats pounded
Over the harsh and relenting road;
It was cold, the snow high; I was old, and the winter
Sharp, and the dead mid-century sped by
In ominous, blurred streaks as, brutish, the wind moaned
Among black branches. I rode through a kind
Of graceless winter nature, bled of what looked like life.
My vexing horse threw me. If it was not safe
In England yet, or ever, that nowhere beneath the gray
Sky would be much safer seemed very plain.
Kind of wonderful to write a poem about one of founders of modern political philosophy. In 1651, Hobbes was returning to England from exile in Paris, and publishing his great work The Leviathan. So brilliant of Hollander to write about the act of returning, and the atmosphere of danger and portent which is at the hear of The Leviathan, rather than write about the work itself.