The art of losing isn't hard to master.
This first line of the poem repeats, with some variation, regularly throughout it. It is a summary of the speaker's stated belief that loss, if addressed reasonably, is easy to deal with. It also establishes the idea that loss, like any art, should be practiced often so that the artist can become skilled at it. In this case, a person masters the art of loss when they no longer let it affect them. In a sense, the poem as a whole is the speaker's attempt to master loss by minimizing it, desensitizing themselves to it, and rationalizing it.
None of these will bring disaster.
This line is one instance of the poem's second refrain, which riffs upon the idea that loss is a minor obstacle rather than a disaster. Though this refrain is repeated with many variations, it always ends with the word "disaster." This reveals the speaker's unstated preoccupation: while they overtly assert that loss is not a disaster, their parting word to the reader is "disaster." As a result, readers are left with the word "disaster" as their final and most lasting impression of the line. This indicates that they may consider loss and disaster more closely linked than they choose to admit.
Accept the fluster/of lost door keys, the hour badly spent.
Here, the speaker begins actually instructing readers—or perhaps encouraging themself—in how to practice the art of losing. The first step to becoming masterful at loss, they suggest, is to become accustomed to losing small and everyday possessions. Though these first losses share the attribute of being relatively minor and low in value, they diverge in another sense: one is a small object, which can be lost in the sense of being misplaced, while another is an abstract measure of time, which can be lost in the sense of being wasted. Therefore, as Bishop introduces examples of loss, she prepares readers for the wide variety of objects, concepts, places, and people to come later in the poem.
Then practice losing farther, losing faster
This line gives the impression of rapid acceleration as the losses of the poem increase. It begins with the word "then," giving readers the sense that they are being plunged into the middle of an action. The repetitive, alliterative phrase "losing farther, losing faster" echoes the sensation of losses piling on top of one another. Its musicality, meanwhile, prompts readers to continue to the next line, seeking a continuation of the repetitive patterns that have been established. Finally, the words "farther" and "faster" don't only evoke speed—they evoke movement and an evolving vantage point, echoing the experience of movement and transience that the speaker recounts.
places, and names, and where it was you meant/to travel.
This list contains losses of a very particular type: losses of memory. With these items, Bishop illuminates a paradox in the experience of loss. While the blow of loss can be softened by memories of the lost loved one or thing, the loss of memories constitutes a loss unto itself. For instance, later in the poem, the speaker will fondly remember a loved one, using memories to compensate to a degree for the person's absence. Yet in this line, memories aren't permanent and stable—they can easily be forgotten and are as vulnerable to loss as any other person, place, or thing.
I lost my mother’s watch.
The image of the mother's watch pulls more than its fair share of weight in this poem, since it manages to elegantly convey a concrete object and a series of abstract concepts at the same time. The speaker appears to have literally lost an object with aesthetic, sentimental, or material value. But the line also evokes a series of small situations and conflicts. It is possible, for instance, that the speaker has lost a borrowed object, prompting the mother to feel angry. It is also possible that the speaker's mother has died, and that the loss of the watch and its accompanying memories brings with it renewed nostalgia and sadness. Finally, the watch can be understood in symbolic terms—perhaps the lost watch symbolizes estrangement from or grief for the mother. The line's blend of ambiguity and specificity allows for this multitude of potential readings.
my last, or/next-to-last, of three loved houses went.
This line is a perfect encapsulation of the ambivalence at the heart of "One Art." Like the poem as a whole, it displays a mixture of nonchalance and deep feeling, as the speaker attempts to cloak their feelings about loss under a stoic facade. The speaker, in one show of nonchalance, seems unable to distinguish between the three houses in question. They refer to it as the "last," and then self-correct, saying "next-to-last." This can imply either that they are attempting to display a casual attitude, or that they have experienced too many losses to neatly distinguish between them all. The word "went" is also short and casual, understating the intensity of this particular loss. Finally, the word "loved" hints at a depth of feeling that the speaker has thus far not expressed, though its passive-voice construction reduces its particular impact.
I miss them, but it wasn’t a disaster.
This particular variation of the poem's second refrain is a particularly telling one, markedly different from other variations of it. It can also be understood as an encapsulation of the speaker's ambivalence, laid out here in strikingly visual terms. The first half of the sentence, "I miss them," is a straightforward admission of emotional vulnerability. A comma divides that phrase from the next, which contradicts it by claiming that these losses are not disastrous ones. The comma that splits up the phrase reflects the split inside the speaker's mind as they attempt to reconcile two disparate impulses: the impulse to mourn a loss and the impulse to recover from it.
(the joking voice, a gesture/I love)
Here, the speaker lists a series of attributes belonging to the loved one they have lost, allowing themselves an emotional moment of remembrance—even in the midst of repeated claims that the loss hasn't affected them much. The use of parentheses reveals a great deal about the speaker's mindset in this moment. The parentheses act as a container, as if the speaker is limiting themself to expressing emotion in a very restricted manner before reverting back to their stoic manner. Meanwhile, a line break splits the phrase, placing "I love" on its own line. This, the most openly emotional moment in the poem, strikes with a particular impact because it arrives at the very beginning of a line.
(Write it!)
This phrase, like the quote explicated above, is expressed within a set of parentheses. It is contained by and interrupts a repetition of the poem's second refrain. We can therefore understand it as the speaker urging themself to finish the line or the poem. They seem to need quite a bit of urging, if the italics, imperative mood, and exclamation point are any indication—the speaker seems frustrated with their own inability to wrap up the poem. This is a huge indicator that the speaker doesn't actually believe the viewpoint they've been advocating (namely, that loss isn't a disaster). Instead, they're trying as hard as they can to express a stance that contradicts their own feelings and experiences.
