Drinking Away the Pains of Love

Drinking alcohol is an age-old remedy for the pains of love. The poem’s narrator, the stranger, and the subject of Webb Pierce’s song all use alcohol as an emotional numbing agent to forget about losing their loves. A parallel most closely exists between the stranger drinking and the subject of Pierce’s song (or Pierce himself if the song is autobiographic). Both characters have been “burned” by love and use alcohol to forget about this. Pierce’s song sarcastically states this is his first drink today, and the narrator in Callimachus’ poem states that it is the stranger’s third drink, showing that both are going beyond casual drinking into drunkenness to completely “dim” their pains. Both the stranger and the song’s subject are described as having a “wound” or being “in misery,” showing the intense nature of their emotional hurt.

Despite the stranger and the subject of Pierce’s song both using alcohol to numb their pain from lost love, there is little information about how the stranger has “been burned.” The narrator in Callimachus’ poem simply states that he knows the stranger’s look of pain from experience, but the reason for his pain is never revealed. Conversely, Pierce’s song is more descriptive about the reasons for his drinking, stating that his love has left him and that he does not know where she is. Therefore, both the stranger in the poem and the narrator in the song use alcohol to alleviate their pain from love, but the poem is nondescript about the reasons for his pain whereas Pierce’s song is more explicit. Additionally, Callimachus’ poem describes the stranger from a third party’s perspective, whereas Pierce’s song is a first person account of the “burned” lover. 

Callimachus 43, pp.138

We didn’t notice that the stranger has a wound. What a painful sigh he heaved (did you see?) when he drank his third cup…He’s burned, and bad! I’m not just guessing, by the gods. A thief knows the tracks of a thief.