Poetry William Carlos Williams (good book club books .TXT) 📖

and laughing:
“River, we are old, you and I,
We are old and by bad luck, beggars.
Lo, the filth in our hair, our bodies stink!
Old friend, here I have brought you
The young soul you long asked of me.
Stand forth, river, and give me
The old friend of my revels!
Give me the well-worn spirit,
For here I have made a room for it,
And I will return to you forthwith
The youth you have long asked of me:
Stand forth, river, and give me
The old friend of my revels!”

And the filthy Passaic consented!

Then she, leaping up with a fierce cry:
“Enter, youth, into this bulk!
Enter, river, into this young man!”
Then the river began to enter my heart,
Eddying back cool and limpid
Into the crystal beginning of its days.
But with the rebound it leaped forward:
Muddy, then black and shrunken
Till I felt the utter depth of its rottenness
The vile breadth of its degradation
And dropped down knowing this was me now.
But she lifted me and the water took a new tide
Again into the older experiences,
And so, backward and forward,
It tortured itself within me
Until time had been washed finally under,
And the river had found its level
And its last motion had ceased
And I knew all⁠—it became me.
And I knew this for double certain
For there, whitely, I saw myself
Being borne off under the water!
I could have shouted out in my agony
At the sight of myself departing
Forever⁠—but I bit back my despair
For she had averted her eyes
By which I knew well what she was thinking⁠—
And so the last of me was taken.

Then she, “Be mostly silent!”
And turning to the river, spoke again:
“For him and for me, river, the wandering,
But by you I leave for happiness
Deep foliage, the thickest beeches⁠—
Though elsewhere they are all dying⁠—
Tallest oaks and yellow birches
That dip their leaves in you, mourning,
As now I dip my hair, immemorial
Of me, immemorial of him
Immemorial of these our promises!
Here shall be a bird’s paradise,
They sing to you remembering my voice:
Here the most secluded spaces
For miles around, hallowed by a stench
To be our joint solitude and temple;
In memory of this clear marriage
And the child I have brought you in the late years.
Live, river, live in luxuriance
Remembering this our son,
In remembrance of me and my sorrow
And of the new wandering!”

The Late Singer

Here it is spring again
and I still a young man!
I am late at my singing.
The sparrow with the black rain on his breast
has been at his cadenzas for two weeks past:
What is it that is dragging at my heart?
The grass by the back door
is stiff with sap.
The old maples are opening
their branches of brown and yellow moth-flowers.
A moon hangs in the blue
in the early afternoons over the marshes.
I am late at my singing.

March I

Winter is long in this climate
and spring⁠—a matter of a few days
only⁠—a flower or two picked
from mud or from among wet leaves
or at best against treacherous
bitterness of wind, and sky shining
teasingly, then closing in black
and sudden, with fierce jaws.

II

March,
you remind me of
the pyramids, our pyramids⁠—
stript of the polished stone
that used to guard them!
March,
you are like Fra Angelico
at Fiesole, painting on plaster!

March,
you are like a band of
young poets that have not learned
the blessedness of warmth
(or have forgotten it).

At any rate⁠—
I am moved to write poetry
for the warmth there is in it
and for the loneliness⁠—
a poem that shall have you
in it March.

III

See!
Ashur-ban-i-pal,
the archer king, on horse-back,
in blue and yellow enamel!
with drawn bow⁠—facing lions
standing on their hind legs,
fangs bared! his shafts
bristling in their necks!

Sacred bulls⁠—dragons
in embossed brickwork
marching⁠—in four tiers⁠—
along the sacred way to
Nebuchadnezzar’s throne hall!
They shine in the sun,
they that have been marching⁠—
marching under the dust of
ten thousand dirt years.

Now⁠—
they are coming into bloom again!
See them!
marching still, bared by
the storms from my calendar
—winds that blow back the sand!
winds that enfilade dirt!
winds that by strange craft
have whipt up a black army
that by pick and shovel
bare a procession to
the god, Marduk!

Natives cursing and digging
for pay unearth dragons with
upright tails and sacred bulls
alternately⁠—
in four tiers⁠—
lining the way to an old altar!
Natives digging at old walls⁠—
digging me warmth⁠—digging me
sweet loneliness⁠—
high enamelled walls.

IV

My second spring⁠—
passed in a monastery
with plaster walls⁠—in Fiesole
on the hill above Florence.

My second spring⁠—painted
a virgin⁠—in a blue aureole
sitting on a three-legged stool,
arms crossed⁠—
she is intently serious,
and still
watching an angel
with colored wings
half kneeling before her⁠—
and smiling⁠—the angel’s eyes
holding the eyes of Mary
as a snake’s holds a bird’s.
On the ground there are flowers,
trees are in leaf.

V

But! now for the battle!
Now for murder⁠—now for the real thing!
My third springtime is approaching!

Winds!
lean, serious as a virgin,
seeking, seeking the flowers of March.

Seeking
flowers nowhere to be found,
they twine among the bare branches
in insatiable eagerness⁠—
they whirl up the snow
seeking under it⁠—
they⁠—the winds⁠—snakelike
roar among yellow reeds
seeking flowers⁠—flowers.

I spring among them
seeking one flower
in which to warm myself!

I deride with all the ridicule
of misery⁠—
my own starved misery.

Counter-cutting winds
strike against me
refreshing their fury!

Come, good, cold fellows!
Have we no flowers?
Defy then with even more
desperation than ever⁠—being
lean and frozen!

But though you are lean and frozen⁠—
think of the blue bulls of Babylon.

Fling yourselves upon
their empty roses⁠—
cut savagely!

But⁠—
think of the painted monastery
at Fiesole.

Berket and the Stars

A day on the boulevards chosen out of ten years of
student poverty! One best day out of ten good ones.
Berket in high spirits⁠—“Ha, oranges! Let’s have one!”
And he made to snatch an orange from the vender’s cart.

Now so clever was the deception, so nicely timed
to the full sweep of certain wave summits,
that the rumor of the thing has come down through
three generations⁠—which is relatively forever!

A Celebration

A middle-northern March, now as always⁠—
gusts from the south broken against cold winds⁠—
but from under, as if a slow hand lifted a tide,
it moves⁠—not into April⁠—into a second March,
the old skin of wind-clear scales dropping
upon the mould: this is the shadow projects the tree
upward causing the sun to shine in his sphere.

So we will put on our pink felt hat⁠—new last year!
—newer this by virtue of brown eyes turning back
the seasons⁠—and let