‘When Helen Keller Met Mark Twain’: A Poem by Brian Yapko

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When Helen Keller Met Mark Twain

—a poem about America

Date: November 2, 1934, Place: New York City: Madison
Square Garden after Helen Keller delivers a speech
honoring the Salvation Army. An old reporter recognizes
one of the attendees.

You flatter me! It’s rare I’m asked to speak.
I’m no one known to history and yet
One of the few attendees still alive
Who saw and heard that special introduction.
My memory, I fear, is somewhat faded
But helped by sections of Miss Keller’s book.
So let me tell you all I can recall
About that consequential date and place
When two great icons first met face to face.

At that point Helen was still rather young
While Twain was one of our most famous sons.
It was quite cold—a rather gusty day
In early March of 1895.
We met at Laurence Hutton’s New York house—
A nice Manhattan brownstone—long since gone.
Imagine! That was forty years ago!
It was a different world—the Gilded Age.
A time which was more elegant and sage.

In those days Laurence was still occupied
As editor of Harper’s Magazine.
This was, I think, nine years before he died.
He had a nose for talent and keen minds
And hosted friends who glittered in the arts.
He liked me though I never found real fame.
I’d had some literary aspirations
But not enough for notoriety.
This lunch was meant for titans, not for me.

When Helen entered it was with her teacher,
Anne Sullivan, who one day Twain would say
Worked miracles. And as for Helen she
Was just 14 and rather plain. I fretted.
When meeting this poor girl, how should I act?
I walked on eggshells—but there was no need.
Her smile was bright and she was full of life!
Remarkably, her soul seemed much her own.
Of course, at this point she was not well-known.

Well, fame would come. This child was deaf and blind
From scarlet fever when she was a babe
In rural Alabama. From that time
Her eyes saw nothing and she had no words
Nor manners till Miss Sullivan was hired—
A teacher who could tug at Helen’s mind;
Who somehow pierced the silence and the dark
To teach this broken girl unmatched resilience,
And somehow tap her unexpected brilliance.

Throughout the luncheon those two sat as one.
Miss Sullivan did not leave Helen’s side
But used her hands and touch to translate all
As Helen’s fingers felt her lips and throat.
She “read” vibrations as if she could hear!
I was impressed at how alive she seemed,
How pleased that an adventure was at hand!
She showed such promise—such respect for knowledge—
One felt somehow she might yet manage college.

I vividly recall when he arrived—
It’s Mr. Clemens that I’m speaking of—
Mark Twain, our nation’s literary father!
To meet him was like meeting Uncle Sam!
A friend to presidents and financiers
Yet bruised by bankruptcy and shifting tastes.
At sixty he remained the well-loved writer
Who penned Tom Sawyer, Huckleberry Finn,
And more. A wit with a sardonic grin.

How grand the way young Helen’s face lit up
When introduced to Twain! And what a joy
To see Twain soften. In fact he seemed smitten
With this young girl who’d pushed back at misfortune.
That day they somehow ended up good friends.
Twain raved about her to his wealthy patrons
And said her tale must edify the world!
When lunch was done she gave him an embrace
And I could see a tear roll down his face.

The years passed. Helen grew by leaps and bounds
And made enormous academic strides
As Twain worked as her advocate to get
Her schooling paid. He fundraised with this thought:
If any tale should have a happy ending
Then Helen Keller’s ought to top the list.
With Twain’s support, she graduated Radcliffe.
The first blind-deaf girl with an earned degree—
A most unique, acclaimed celebrity!

Her progress warmed Twain’s heart in his last years
As he received awards and final cheers
While giving aid to charitable works.
I heard he met Miss Keller two times more;
But no, I wasn’t there. And then of course
Twain died in 1910 just as he planned:
The sage was born when Halley’s comet came
In 1835. And, as Fate steered,
Twain died when Halley’s comet reappeared.

And as for Helen, she soon found her fame:
An activist, a zealous suffragette;
A heroine for people blind or deaf.
But she has said she never will forget
America’s great writer—that good man—
Her benefactor. More than that: her friend.
How strange that two such very different souls
From different backgrounds, each with ardent pride,
Should yet turn out to be so warmly tied.

But then I think: America! This land
Where anything at all can come to pass.
Where it’s not how you’re born, it’s what you do.
Where friends can gather, friends of every ilk
And kindle greatness in each other’s work!
For all with ears to hear and eyes to see,
This is the land of opportunity.
A place of miracles few can explain
So well as Helen Keller and Mark Twain!

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Poet’s Note

In March of 1895, fourteen-year-old Helen Keller met Samuel Clemens for the first time at a gathering at Laurence Hutton’s New York home. Hutton was the literary editor of Harper’s Magazine at the time. After being introduced to Clemens, Helen sat on a couch beside him while he began to recount some of his humorous tales. She listened by pressing her fingers across his lips.

From his autobiography, Twain’s own words about that first encounter: “I told her a long story, which she interrupted all along and in the right places, with cackles, chuckles and care-free bursts of laughter,” he recalled. “Then Miss Sullivan put one of Helen’s hands against her lips and spoke against it the question, ‘What is Mr. Clemens distinguished for?’ Helen answered, in her crippled speech, ‘For his humor.’ I spoke up modestly and said, ‘And for his wisdom.’ Helen said the same words instantly—‘and for his wisdom.’ I suppose it was mental telegraphy for there was no way for her to know what I had said.” From that initial encounter, an unlikely friendship began between an aging author and a brilliant young woman that would last beyond the years that Clemens would remain on this earth.

More on the friendship between Helen Keller and Mark Twain can be found here: https://www.openculture.com/2024/08/mark-twain-and-helen-kellers-special-friendship.html

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Brian Yapko is a retired lawyer whose poetry has appeared in over fifty journals.  He is the winner of the 2023 SCP International Poetry Competition. Brian is also the author of several short stories, the science fiction novel El Nuevo Mundo and the gothic archaeological novel  Bleeding Stone.  He lives in Wimauma, Florida.