In a Dark Time … The Eye Begins to See

Whitman’s use of the term “dumb ministers” in “Crossing Brooklyn Ferry” to describe objects that contribute to our soul, and Jonathan Delacour’s ongoing discussion of “objective description” and “subjective description” somehow reminded me of William Carlos Williams’ “The Red Wheelbarrow,” a poem students often found “dumb,” though not in the sense Whitman used it. “The Red [...]

Following a recent discussion of Pound’s winning of the Bollingen prize, I read that two of the judges had nominated William Carlos Williams instead. Although I haven’t read Williams for awhile, I remembered some poems fondly, poems I’d previously referred to in this blog. Pursuing this line of thought, I discovered the following comments at [...]

One of the traits I most admire in William Carlos Williams’ The Collected Later Poems is Williams’ ability to find beauty in common, everyday situations, and to describe that beauty in everyday language. It’s easy to find beauty at the beach or in the mountains, but it’s far easier to be overcome by the ugliness [...]