—Wallace Stevens, Poetry, October 1921
From The Open Door: 100 Poems, 100 Years of Poetry Magazine (University of Chicago Press, October 2012). Find some of Christian Wiman’s favorite discoveries from the past 100 years of Poetry—the introduction to the centennial anthology is available here.
Posts tagged Wallace Stevens
Waving Adieu, Adieu, AdieuThat would be waving and that would be crying,Crying and shouting and meaning farewell,Farewell in the eyes and farewell at the centre,Just to stand still without moving a hand..In a world without heaven to follow, the stopsWould be endings more poignant than partings, profounder,And that would be saying farewell, repeating farewell,Just to be there and just to behold..To be one’s singular self, to despiseThe being that yielded so little, acquiredSo little, too little to care, to turnTo the ever-jubilant weather, to sip.One’s cup and never to say a word,Or to sleep or just to lie there still,Just to be there, just to be beheld,That would be bidding farewell, be bidding farewell..One likes to practice the thing. They practice,Enough, for heaven. Ever-jubilant,What is there here but weather, what spirithave I except it comes from the sun?.by Wallace Stevens

