2000 ‘What Does It Matter Now’

Fuller, an American poet based in Chicago, earned a PhD in English Literature early in his career. In 2000 he published ‘What Does It Matter Now’, emphasizing the tragedy of Spens’s commitment to duty. ‘What Does It Matter Now’ begins with the line ‘Standing around on principle’ and suggests that though Spens was ‘given only to inner sense’ and ‘a few facts have died or were revoked’, his life ends futilely—as does the poem:

tossed on the sand
he plays with his bones
the lessor finds him there

By titling the poem ‘What Does It Matter Now’ and describing the terrestrial scenery that Spens perhaps imagines as his death becomes inevitable, Fuller asks the reader to wonder if all of Spens’s high morality was really worth it—or if any endeavour is in the end. The lessor, the property owner, is still alive and in power. Yet Fuller ends with a thoughtful homophone here, as this may be read as ‘lesser’, just as the lords in ‘Spens’ are shown as lesser people, dead at the skipper’s feet.