Friday, April 16, 2010

This Is Just to Say


I have eaten
the plums
that were in
the icebox

and which
you were probably
saving
for breakfast

Forgive me
they were delicious
so sweet
and so cold




William Carlos Williams
American Poet
1883 - 1963

8 comments:

  1. Oh, I LOVE this one! I've even though of writing it on the back of a grocery store receipt or envelope and sticking it up on my fridge.

    I think I might do that this morning.
    :-)

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  2. I remember studying this poem in a 20th century literature course at some point... I don't think I liked it then (modernism=yuck), but now it seems more apropos. :) I think the photo helps a lot.

    Thanks for reminding me!

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  3. Yup, he's a modernist. So, I was surprised that I liked this one. It may have had more to do with the fact that I indeed found three plums in the 'fridge's fruit bin.....

    leftover from Vivian's shopping at Spring Break. I'm enjoying them on a plate she painted at the pottery shop.

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  4. BTW Mrs McCarthy ~

    I love your photography on Viva Dolce.

    I'd like to see what you could do with those three plums ;-)

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  5. He's an Imagist, which I guess is a subset of being a Modernist... The way to read him is to think of his poems as American Haiku.

    I love this one, too:

    ~*~ ~*~ ~*~

    so much depends
    upon

    a red wheel
    barrow

    glazed with rain
    water

    beside the white
    chickens

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  6. Yes, I was just reading about him at Wikipedia, Kelly....where it says that by the time he was published, he was more associated with the Modernists and had *rejected* the Imagist movement.

    He's somewhat interesting to me because he was a doctor. I love getting my hands on JAMA, where each week the cover highlights a piece of artwork and there is a poem just after the table on contents.

    But that's about all I like about the AMA :-\

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  7. Oh, I didn't know he'd rejected the Imagist movement. I only remember that he was an Imaginst because I noticed his name when I was looking up John Gould Fletcher in 2008 -- you'd challenged me to find a poet from my native Arkansas, and I really liked what I read of Fletcher, who was associated with the Imagists.

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  8. Love that poem! And I love your photo illustrating it!

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