Jack Rose is a heroin dealer who keeps himself at a bitter distance from the world, too doubtful to seek fame and too cold to use what he sells. He enjoys watching addiction destroy others, until May Bulger enters his life. She sleeps with him to get heroin for her brother, hating both herself and Jack’s unfeeling frown. Jack hates her too, because her knowing smile breaks his lonely, ascetic shell. When her brother dies, Jack sits with her and plays a mouth-harp while she weeps—a needling, almost cruel gesture. But when she finally smiles at him, stripped and grim, something in him collapses. His head drops into her lap, and after a stiff pause, she strokes his hair. The narrator’s cool, shadowed tone makes the final gesture feel strangely tender: two damaged people finding an uncomfortable closeness through grief and resentment.
Jack Rose — Summary
With crafty brooding life turned to Jack Rose And made him heroin-peddler, and his pose Was sullenly reflective since he feared That life, regarding him, had merely jeered. His vanity was small and could not call His egoism to the dubious hall Of fame, where average artists spend their hour. Doubting his powers he was forced to cower Within the shrill, damp alleys of his time, Immersed in that brisk midnight known as crime. He shunned the fiercely shrewd stuff that he sold To other people, and derived a cold Enjoyment from the writhing of their hearts. A speechless artist, he admired the arts Of blundering destruction, like a monk Viewing a play that made him mildly drunk. And so malicious and ascetic Jack Bent to his trade with a relentless back Until he tapped an unexpected smile-- A woman's smile as smooth and hard as tile. May Bulger pawned her flesh to him and gave His heroin to her brother, with a grave Reluctance fumbling at her painted lips. Though angry at herself, she took the whips Of undesired love, to quiet a boy Who wept inanely for his favorite toy. She hated Jack because he failed to gloss And soften the rough surface of her loss, His matter-of-fact frown biting at her heart. He hated her because her smiling guess Had robbed him of ascetic loneliness, And when her brother died, Jack sat beside Her grief and played a mouth-harp while she cried. But when she raised her head and smiled at him-- A smile intensely stripped and subtly grim-- His hate felt overawed and in a trap, And suddenly his head fell to her lap. For some time she sat stiffly in the chair, Then slowly raised her hand and stroked his hair.