Robert Lowell seemed to have a pretty stressful and crazy life, and his poems were pretty odd to me as well. In Skunk Hour, I think I liked the meaning behind this poem, or at least appreciate what he was saying about what New England was, and what New England is turning into. "Nautilus Island's hermit heiress" was buying up property around her so she could be alone, private, live her life according to her. She had the right to do this, but that doesn't mean it's the right thing to do, and Lowell thought not. She wasn't helping the problem his part of New England was facing, she was adding to it. After she bought the property, she didn't fix them up in order to keep the area nice, she only bought them in order to keep people away from her. I think "we've lost our summer millionaire" refers to the rich people living up there for the summer have moved back home for the fall and winter, and now the "season's ill" because there isn't money left in the town. The town he once loved is changing for the worse, and turning into a tourist attraction, and when the season is over, it's only the locals left over, and they need the tourists to survive . When he talks about only seeing skunks looking for food, I believe that is further showing the emptiness of the town he once knew and loved, only to see it depleted without seasonal tourism. Is he asking what happened to the time when the locals could survive on their own? Was skunk chosen to paint a picture of the towns current state?