Tortured Loneliness of Robert Lowell's Essay

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The skunks are a potent contrast between the gentility symbolized by the millionaire's casually auctioned-off yacht, yet like the auctioned boat, they are also a symbol of waste and decay. The skunks' willingness to eat anything is also a contrast with the poet's deeper sense of existential dread and sorrow about his plight, as he sadly listens to "Love, O careless Love...." On the radio, symbolizing his inability to find love in the world (30).

The themes of the poem are alienation, a lack of love, and the base nature of existence. The poet feels alienated from the WASPY, wealthy, and superficial world he describes yet also depressed about its decline. He cannot find love amongst the 'love cars' that lie together -- symbolizing the couples within the cars lying together. He is up at a time when few people are awake who besides teenagers in cars 'making out.' Only the skunks keep him company, and they are only interested in food. The fact that the poet only has skunks to be with symbolizes his isolation, but also the sorry state of humanity in general as the skunk -- like the rich people of Maine and the people making out in cars -- desperately searches for sustenance in an ugly world.

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The fact that the poet is awake and alone during 'skunk hour' -- an early hour -- near a place filled with garbage smells indicates his dissatisfaction with his lonely life and his restless mind. The skunks remind the poet of his insomnia and despair, as he watches them, alone. Yet he also holds back from them, partially in horror and disgust, just as he also holds back from the rest of humanity around him......

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