An Analysis of the poem “To The Mercy-Killers”
Dudley Randall’s poem To the Mercy Killers tackles one of the most controversial issues in America today: euthanasia. No other issue has divided and caused much division and divergence in thought and views in this county as mercy killing and has through the years along with abortion become the defining topic of politics in America. Mercy killing and in fact the very question of what defines life has becoming a moral dilemma and a divisive factor in our society. Dudley Randall’s To the Mercy Killers is a moving appeal against the practice of mercy killing and the tormenting affect it has on its victims.
The poem was written in 1973 by the African-American poet and librarian Dudley Randall and has since become one of the most effective poetical pieces against mercy killing. The opening of the poem is characterized by a curious ironic choice of words such as “if ever mercy move you murder me/I pray you, kindly killers, let me live.”(1-2) These ironic choices of words are then repeated throughout the poem to an agonizing affect. The speaker in the poem begs for a chance to be allowed to live pleading that, “even though I turn a traitor to myself as beg to die, do not accomplice me.” (9-10) This line skillfully captures the utter hopelessness and misery faced by victims of mercy killings and the carefully chosen word “traitor,” adds to the overall theme of despondency of the poem. Any-one who has come across a person in a vegetative state and the terrible tribulations they go through knows the horrific look on their faces and the “beg to die,” facade they wear, a façade because that might not be how they really feel like deep down in their hearts and hence the statement “do not accomplice me,” shows what Dudley Randall views as the true sentiment of the victim.
Widely publicized stories in the popular media have recently brought the issue of vegetative state and mercy killing to the forefronts of our national discussions. The excruciating ordeals that Terri Schiavo and Karen Ann Quinlan faced have highlighted the moral and medical dilemmas faced not only by the victims of this practice but also the divisive influence it has within their families.
The most noticeable feature of mercy killing is its multi-dimensional nature and its ability to be debated from religious, moral, medical, traditional and legal angles. This has had both negative and positive influence in coming to an acceptable conclusion and consensus on this issue; negative because it has complicated and allowed the controversy to drag on endlessly and positive because it has enriched the public discourse and energized our society.
If curious ironic choices of words are the underlying fundamentals of this poem, then its appealing and evocative nature are what truly makes this poem powerful. A prevailing argument used by the pro-mercy killing camp is the utilitarianism approach. This argument states that it is the maximizing conception of the action which defines an action as moral or otherwise and consequently makes the case that “what is good or useful is what produces the greatest satisfaction for the greatest number of people.”
Accordingly, mercy killing is justified on these grounds because it helps end the financial and psychological pain it afflicts on the families of the victims and is seen as a quick and humane end to a tormenting agony. Furthermore, the very question of life is argued about. An established counter-argument by the proponents of mercy killing is the very question of life. A question that is almost always asked is if being sustained through an artificial means such as machines to prolong the life of a person in a vegetative state actually constitutes to life. Dudley Randall adds his own take on this issue when he pleads that we should “never conspire with death to set me free,” (3) and proclaims his preference to a life of pain sustained through an artificial means (“but let me know such life as pain can give). (4)
As a supporter of mercy killings, I have my own objections to Dudley Randall’s argument that a life of pain sustained through an artificial means can truly be called a life because it ignores the other side of the issue: namely the instances where the victims wish to end their dependence on machines to sustain and prolong their painful life. Should these people be forced to go through the pain and anguish that those who are against mercy killing support? I think a person’s life is intrinsically sacred and their desires should be respected. If a victim or their loved one feels that their life can no longer be considered a life, then it makes no sense to go against their wishes. Anna Quindlen who wrote an opinion piece for the Newsweek magazine entitled, The Culture of Each Life, whereby she says, “There are those of us who believe that under certain conditions the cruelest thing you can do to people you love is to force them to live. There are those of us who define living not by whether the heart beats and the lungs lift but whether the spirit is there, whether the music box plays.”
There is a litany of literature that chronicles the pain patients of vegetative state go through, and the utter horror they experience and hence it would be incorrect to debate the misery they go through as a result of being forced to live a life prolonged through machinery and artificial means. Subsequently, the arguments put forth by the Pope John Paul II that “No living human being ever descends to the status of a “vegetable” or an animal. Even our brothers and sisters who find themselves in the clinical condition of a ‘vegetative state’ retain their human dignity in all its fullness,” fails to make the needed argument because of its lack of tackling the main issue at hand. Victims who have to endure a life sustained through artificial means are routinely tortured as a result of their body being forced to function through machines and other artificial means.
Dudley Randall seems to appropriately paint the sadistic picture that victims of vegetative state face. I was particularly moved by the closing lines of the poem, “even though I seem not a human, a mute shelf/of glucose, bottled blood, machinery/ to swell the lung and pump the heart-even so, /do put out my life.”(11-15) Dudley accepts the sad transformation of the patient of a vegetative state and likens them to a“mute shelf…bottled blood” but despite the appropriate paintings of the demoralizing situations such patients face, there is really no tangible reason offered why a victim or their families shouldn’t have the right to choose their own course of action.
Dudley Randall ends his poem with a plea that we all take for granted but one that is inaccessible to patients who are under a vegetative state. The ending words, “let me still glow,” (15) keeps with the overall ironic word choice of the poem and its contradictory nature. A reader will be very justified in asking how a person who has been forced to live through such a throbbing ordeal and even called a “clot, an aching clench, a stub, a stump, a butt….screaming pain, a putrefying stench,” (5-7) would want to “still glow,” (15) and runs to contrary to what one would expect. However, it can also be read as the ultimate manifestation of hope and can even be called resilience because the speaker in the face of stark adversary continues to stay course and perseveres.
The poet Dudley Randall wrote his poem To the Mercy Killers in 1973 and despite the maturity of medical technology and the variations in the arguments of both camps, his poem is still as relevant today as it was when it was first written and if longevity and relevancy are the two criteria that a poet’s worth are measured, then Dudley Randall’s To the Mercy Killers has truly passed these yardsticks.
