Find myself thinking about Williams today-- William Carlos Williams, some of whose poetry (especially the early stuff) is absolutely gorgeous. Below are a few offerings, the first of which is a response to Henry James that James would likely have found entirely too sexual. It's wonderfully seductive, though.

Portrait of a Lady

Your thighs are appletrees
whose blossoms touch the sky.
Which sky? The sky
where Watteau hung a lady's
slipper. Your knees
are a southern breeze—or
a gust of snow. Agh! what
sort of man was Fragonard?
—As if that answered
anything.—Ah, yes. Below
the knees, since the tune
drops that way, it is
one of those white summer days,
the tall grass of your ankles
flickers upon the shore—
Which shore?—
the sand clings to my lips—
Which shore?
Agh, petals maybe. How
should I know?
Which shore? Which shore?
—the petals from some hidden
appletree—Which shore?
I said petals from an appletree.

The Dance

In Breughel's great picture, The Kermess,
the dancers go round, they go round and
around, the squeal and the blare and the
tweedle of bagpipes, a bugle and fiddles
tipping their bellies, (round as the thick-
sided glasses whose wash they impound)
their hips and their bellies off balance
to turn them. Kicking and rolling about
the Fair Grounds, swinging their butts, those
shanks must be sound to bear up under such
rollicking measures, prance as they dance
in Breughel's great picture, The Kermess

The Rose from Spring and All

The rose is obsolete
but each petal ends in
an edge, the double facet
cementing the grooved
columns of air-- The edge
cuts without cutting
meets--nothing--renews
itself in metal or porcelain--

whither? It ends--

But if it ends
the start is begun
so that to engage roses
becomes a geometry--

Sharper, neater, more cutting
figured in majolica--
the broken plate
glazed with a rose

Somewhere the sense
makes copper roses
steel roses--

The rose carried the weight of love
but love is at an end-- of roses
It is at the edge of the
petal that love waits

Crisp, worked to defeat
laboredness--fragile
plucked, moist, half-raised
cold, precise, touching

What

The place between the petal's
edge and the

From the petal's edge a line starts
that being of steel
infinitely fine, infinitely
rigid penetrates
the Milky Way
without contact--lifting
from it-- neither hanging
nor pushing--

The fragility of the flower
unbruised
penetrates space.

Part V of History

But it is five o'clock. Come!
Life is good -- enjoy it!
A walk in the park while the day lasts.
I will go with you. Look! this
northern scenery is not the Nile, but --
these benches-- the yellow and purple
dusk--
the moon there-- these tired people--
the lights on the water!

Are not these Jews-- and Ethiopians?
The world is young, surely! Young
and colored like-- a girl that has come
upon
a lover! Will that do?

You Have Pissed Your Life

Any way you walk
Any way you turn
Any way you stand
Any way you lie

You have pissed your life

From an intellectual fool
butting his head blindly
against obstacles, become
brilliant-- focusing,
performing accurately to
a given end--

Any way you walk
Any way you turn
Any way you stand
Any way you lie

You have pissed your life

The Girl

The wall, as I watched, came neck-high
to her walking difficulty
seaward of it over sand and stones. She

made the effort, mounted it while I
had my head turned, I merely
saw her on top at the finish rolling

over. She stood up dusted off her skirt
then there lifted her feet
unencumbered to skip dancing away

Love Song : First Version: 1915

What have I to say to you
When we shall meet?
Yet--
I lie here thinking of you.

The stain of love
is upon the world.
Yellow, yellow, yellow,
It eats into the leaves,
Smears with saffron
The horned branches that lean
Heavily
Against a smooth purple sky.

There is no light--
Only a honey-thick stain
That drips from leaf to leaf
And limb to limb
Spoiling the colors
Of the whole world.

I am alone.
The weight of love
Has bouyed me up
Till my head
Knocks against the sky.

See me!
My hair is dripping with nectar--
Starlings carry it
On their black wings.
See at last
My arms and my hands
Are lying idle.

How can I tell
If I shall ever love you again
As I do now?

And it's marvellous stuff, isn't it? In these poems (and others), Williams rivals Stevens for lushness and sensuality, though the poems themselves thankfully avoid the trap of over-sentimentality. Unfortunately, most people only know Williams' fragment poems "this is just to say" and "the red wheel barrow," so their familiarity with him is minimal, and their relationship stilted. I find my relationship with Williams very awkward: in many of the later poems, including Paterson, I find I tire of him quickly and need to turn my back on him; at other turns, I'll look at Williams again, as I do now, after a long separation, and I'll find myself savouring the poems like a very fine wine. Right now, I've got a very pleasant buzz going. ;-) Rediscoveries are wonderful things....