Wallace Stevens - Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird

December 4, 2009

A week end poem from Ivan--- On Fri, 4/12/09, Poetry Chaikhana <ivan wrote:

Here's your Daily Poem from the Poetry Chaikhana --

Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird

By Wallace Stevens(1879 - 1955)

IAmong twenty snowy mountains,The only moving thingWas the eye of the blackbird.III was of three minds,Like a treeIn which there are three blackbirds.IIIThe blackbird whirled in the autumn winds.It was a small part of the pantomime.IVA man and a womanAre one.A man and a woman and a blackbirdAre one.VI do not know which to prefer,The beauty of inflections,Or the beauty of innuendoes,The blackbird whistlingOr just after.VIIcicles filled the long windowWith barbaric glass.The shadow of the blackbirdCrossed it, to and fro.The moodTraced in the shadowAn indecipherable cause.VIIO thin men of HaddamWhy do you imagine golden birds?Do you not see how the blackbirdWalks around the feetOf the women about you?VIIII know

noble accentsAnd lucid, inescapable rhythms;But I know, too,That the blackbird is involvedIn what I know.IXWhen the blackbird flew out of sight,It marked the edgeOf one of many circles.XAt the sight of blackbirdsFlying in a green light,Even the bawds of euphonyWould cry out sharply.XIHe rode over ConnecticutIn a glass coach.Once, a fear pierced him,In that he mistookThe shadow of his equipageFor blackbirds.XIIThe river is moving.The blackbird must be flying.XIIIIt was evening all afternoon.It was snowingAnd it was going to snow.The blackbird satIn the cedar-limbs.

-- from Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird, by Wallace Stevens

Amazon.com / Photo by phoenix wolf-ray /

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Thought for the Day:

Why walk the same waysas everyone elsewhen so much of this magical existenceis uncharted and unknown?

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Hi Alan -I once heard a story about Wallace Stevens: His work as an insurance salesman required him to spend a lot of time on the road. As his poetry gained recognition, he was offered academic positions to focus exclusively on his writing, but he refused to leave his job, saying that his poetry drew its rhythm from the steady flow of lines on the road.I'd be hard-pressed to clearly define what I like about the poetry of Wallace Stevens, but I keep coming back to it with a smile. This poem, for example, his best known... it's just one of those perfect poems. Each little verse is practically a haiku. The words don't even entirely make sense, but they just pull you into the still, present moment. I read this poem on a snowy Colorado day, and the world goes quiet, dusk trickles in through bare branches, my misty breath lights up in the moonlight.And, what is that? A blackbird?

Or some watchful shadow of myself?Have a wonderful weekend!Ivan

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Ivan M. Granger's original poetry, stories and commentaries are 2002 - 2008 by Ivan M. Granger.All other material is copyrighted by the respective authors, translators and/or publishers.

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