THE GREAT FIGURE by William Carlos Williams

Tags

1921, 4*, city, firetruck, gold, gong, light, night, passing, rain, red, rumbling, siren, sound, wheel, William Carlos Williams

                                THE GREAT FIGURE

                Among the rain
                and lights
                I saw the figure 5
                in gold
                on a red
                firetruck
                moving
                tense
                unheeded
                to gong clangs
                siren howls
                and wheels rumbling
                through the dark city.

 

from Sour Grapes, 1921
how could this not be included; how could I not include the painting by Charles Demuth; how emblematic is this of taking the notice of all that is in the universe that we are born to …

 

 

^{————w}(O)rmholes_________________________________|—–

city wormhole: raised brow
gold wormhole: fifty-eight // and silent prayers
light wormhole: despite that
night wormhole: ‘a blacknight fitted perfectly …’
passing & red wormhole: The Boats of Vallisneria by Michael J. Redford – Trees
rain wormhole: ‘… plane is upright …’
sound wormhole: Lapping Reflections [Deep Within Waters] – pigs
William Carlos Williams wormhole: THE LONELY STREET by William Carlos Williams

 

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THE LONELY STREET by William Carlos Williams

Tags

1921, 5*, black, carnation, growth, hands, loneliness, looking, mouth, pink, school, schoolgirls, streets, time, walking, white, William Carlos Williams, yellow

                                THE LONELY STREET

                School is over. It is too hot
                to walk at ease. At ease
                in light frocks they walk the streets
                to while the time away.
                They have grown tall. They hold
                pink flames in their right hands.
                In white from head to foot,
                with sidelong, idle look–
                in yellow, floating stuff,
                black sash and stockings–
                touching their avid mouths
                with pink sugar on a stick–
                like a carnation each holds in her hand–
                they mount the lonely street.

 

from Sour Grapes, 1921

 

 

^{————w}(O)rmholes_________________________________|—–

black wormhole: ‘a blacknight fitted perfectly …’
hands wormhole: we held cold hands
loneliness wormhole: DANSE RUSSE by William Carlos Williams
looking & streets & time & walking wormhole: ‘… plane is upright …’
mouth wormhole: letting them go
pink wormhole: Lapping Reflections [Deep Within Waters] – pigs
school wormhole: how to teach
white wormhole: SPRING & LINES by William Carlos Williams
William Carlos Williams wormhole: LIGHT HEARTED WILLIAM by William Carlos Williams
yellow wormhole: What You Are by Roger McGough

 

LIGHT HEARTED WILLIAM by William Carlos Williams

Tags

1921, 5*, bedroom, blue, child, childhood, green, laughing, looking, November, quiet, shadow, Spring, streets, sunlight, weather, William Carlos Williams, windows

                LIGHT HEARTED WILLIAM

                Light hearted William twirled
                his November moustaches
                and, half dressed, looked
                from the bedroom window
                upon the spring weather.

                Height-ya! sighed he gaily
                leaning out to see
                up and down the street
                where a heavy sunlight
                lay beyond some blue shadows.

                Into the room he drew
                his head again and laughed
                to himself quietly
                twirling his green moustaches.

 

from Sour Grapes, 1921
… and WCW had a son called … William, who was it about, hmmm … twirl

 

 

^{————w}(O)rmholes_________________________________|—–

bedroom wormhole: DANSE RUSSE by William Carlos Williams
blue & green & William Carlos Williams wormhole: BLUEFLAGS by William Carlos Williams
child wormhole: Lapping Reflections [Deep Within Waters] – old George
childhood wormhole: 1964
looking wormhole: THURSDAY by William Carlos Williams
shadow wormhole: sometimes
spring wormhole: SPRING & LINES by William Carlos Williams
streets wormhole: space for probing thought
windows wormhole: the moon, the moon

 

BLUEFLAGS by William Carlos Williams

Tags

1921, 6*, air, blossom, blue, cars, children, distance, flowers, grapes, green, gutter, light, marsh, mist, petals, reeds, smell, strawberries, streets, sun, voices, water, William Carlos Williams, willow

                                BLUEFLAGS

                I stopped the car
                to let the children down
                where the streets end
                in the sun
                at the marsh edge
                and the reeds begin
                and there are small houses
                facing the reeds
                and the blue mist
                in the distance
                with grapevine trellises
                with grape clusters
                small as strawberries
                on the vines
                and ditches
                running springwater
                that continue the gutters
                with willows over them.
                The reeds begin
                like water at a shore
                their pointed petals waving
                dark green and light.
                But blueflags are blossoming
                in the reeds
                which the children pluck
                chattering in the reeds
                high over their heads
                which they part
                with bare arms to appear
                with fists of flowers
                till in the air
                there comes the smell
                of calamus
                from wet, gummy stalks.

 

from Sour Grapes, 1921
WCW was good enough to let us into his local so much that we found his family there too; he espoused the search for poetry within your own fingernails, within your local yards and backstreets, within your private moments in front of your own mirror, within the loaned experience which can only be borrowed when you’ve brought up children and shown them the world in which you brought them to their own existence … rather than charging off for it rummaging about Europe’s kulture: he was an icognito prince, old WCW

 

 

^{————w}(O)rmholes_________________________________|—–

air wormhole: THURSDAY by William Carlos Williams
blossom wormhole: SPRING & LINES by William Carlos Williams
blue wormhole: coterminalism – there is nothing happens by itself, / 070118
cars wormhole: ash leaves
green & William Carlos Williams wormhole: SPRING & LINES by William Carlos Williams
light wormhole: A Solitude by Denise Levertov
mist wormhole: that
smell wormhole: Lapping Reflections [Deep Within Waters] – old George
streets wormhole: we held cold hands
sun wormhole: only
voices & water wormhole: What You Are by Roger McGough

 

SPRING & LINES by William Carlos Williams

Tags

1921, 5*, ageing, blossom, glass, green, grey, hair, leaves, plum, Spring, white, William Carlos Williams

                                SPRING

                O my grey hairs!
                You are truly white as plum blossoms.

 

 

 

                                LINES

                Leaves are greygreen,
                the glass broken, bright green.

 

from Sour Grapes, 1921
there is a beauty to ageing, there is a crack to glass; which cannot be appreciated until one has shifted at right angles to the time it takes or the import it hasn’t

 

 

^{————w}(O)rmholes_________________________________|—–

blossom wormhole: 1959 –– MANHATTAN –– 2012
glass wormhole: behind / glass walls and wan and hooded eye
green & leaves & Spring wormhole: What You Are by Roger McGough
grey wormhole: Lapping Reflections [Deep Within Waters] – both fawn and grey
hair wormhole: fifty-eight // and silent prayers
white wormhole: we held cold hands
William Carlos Williams wormhole: THURSDAY by William Carlos Williams

 

THURSDAY by William Carlos Williams

Tags

1921, 6*, air, ambition, awareness, being, body, breathing, clothes, dream, eight worldly dharmas, feeling, feet, ground, hats, life, living, looking, nose, shoes, sky, talking to myself, Thursday, weight, William Carlos Williams

                                THURSDAY

                I have had my dream–like others–
                and it has come to nothing, so that
                I remain now carelessly
                with feet planted on the ground
                and look up at the sky–
                feeling my clothes around me,
                the weight of my body in my shoes,
                the rim of my hat, air passing in and out
                at my nose–and decide to dream no more.

 

from Sour Grapes, 1921

a song, perhaps, to sing when once one is retired, althout WCW was only in his thirties when he wrote this, which possibly means you don’t have to wait to be broken by the long haul in order to realise the beauty oftheworldwhichcrushesyou is precisely where you stand in it with being rather than reach …; we try to make ourselves so solid and de-fined by what we want rather than what we are, that we are afraid of the openness of the sky that arcs so far away from us, but that when we jump right into it – the ultimate skinny-dip – we feel ourselves so solid on the ground from which we leapt … he wasn’t a showman, old Bull Williams, but he knew his shit, even from the age when you wouldn’t believe it

 

 

^{————w}(O)rmholes_________________________________|—–

air & being wormhole: A Solitude by Denise Levertov
awareness wormhole: letting them go
breathing wormhole: Khandro Tsering Chodron
dream wormhole: “I need help”
feet wormhole: What You Are by Roger McGough
life wormhole: Lapping Reflections [Deep Within Waters] – old George
living wormhole: `whappn’d!
looking wormhole: cowl
sky wormhole: we held cold hands
talking to myself wormhole: so / do I keep on writing now I’ve retired, or … / Rumplestiltskin
William Carlos Williams wormhole: JANUARY by William Carlos Williams

 

JANUARY by William Carlos Williams

Tags

1921, 4*, dialogue, distraction, January, music, temptation, William Carlos Williams, wind, windows, writing

                                   JANUARY

                Again I reply to the triple winds
                running chromatic fifths of derision
                outside my window:
                                                     Play louder.
                You will not succeed. I am
                bound more to my sentences
                the more you batter at me
                to follow you.
                                         And the wind,
                as before, fingers perfectly
                its derisive music.

 

from Sour Grapes, 1921

it’s the immanence of writing within the experience that it is writing about that makes writing a wrestling match between perception and the thought thereof …

 

 

^{————w}(O)rmholes_________________________________|—–

distraction wormhole: divergent // direction
music wormhole: TREES by William Carlos Williams
William Carlos Williams wormhole: THE DESOLATE FIELD by William Carlos Williams
wind & windows wormhole: What You Are by Roger McGough
writing wormhole: Lapping Reflections [Deep Within Waters] – old George

 

THE DESOLATE FIELD by William Carlos Williams

Tags

1921, 5*, air, being, field, goat, grass, grey, heart, identity, love, sky, William Carlos Williams

                THE DESOLATE FIELD

                Vast and grey, the sky
                in a simulacrum
                to all but him whose days
                are vast and grey, and–
                In the tall, dried grasses
                a goat stirs
                with nozzle searching the ground.
                –my head is in the air
                but who am I ..?
                And amazed my heart leaps
                at the thought of love
                vast and grey
                yearning silently over me.

 

from Sour Grapes, 1921

I read this field so many years ago; it left a sort-of impression because I liked the word ‘simulacrum’ although I didn’t know what it meant or why it was in this poem; now, I think I know the field – in fact, have known the field all along – and I realise I am just a goat and that there is no other love to find than the grass out of the ground

 

 

^{————w}(O)rmholes_________________________________|—–

air wormhole: transferring
being & identity & love wormhole: Khandro Tsering Chodron
field wormhole: looking ahead
grey wormhole: TREES by William Carlos Williams
sky & William Carlos Williams wormhole: TO A SOLITARY DISCIPLE by William Carlos Williams

 

Evening Wind, 1921

Tags

'scape, 1921, 2015, air, breathing, dream, Edward Hopper, evening, mind, naked, open, paint, portrait, sleep, stone, town, wind, windows, work, years

 

 

 

                Evening Wind, 1921

                      ahhh,

                      I have
                      washed

                      the bed
                      is open

                      and cold
                      I shall

                      dry my
                      self in

                      the air
                      of town

                      and breathe
                      the scent

                      of stone
                      and paint

                      work port-
                      al to dream

                      where the
                      work can

                      continue
                      all night

                      with vigour

 

 

 

^{————w}(O)rmholes_________________________________|—–

air & breathing & open wormhole: the / very gradual art of sitting
dream & Edward Hopper & windows wormhole: that comicbookshop in dreams,
evening wormhole: “King …”
mind wormhole: good session
sleep wormhole: for goodness’ sake
stone wormhole: Exceat to Cuckmere Haven
wind wormhole: along
work wormhole: prayer to my self
years wormhole: Detective Comics #345