 of Stephen's first book, Harmonium, was entitled Sea Surface Full of Clouds. For a while this poem was thought to be unencumbered by meaning. However, not long ago, one little magazine published an explication of it which required eight pages of text and a rather large chart. All of Mr. Stephen's poems have meaning, and indeed one of the remarkable things about his work is its thematic unity. Mr. Stephen's remarked early in his career that it's important for a poet to discover a point of view and to stick to it. To fidget with points of view, he said, leads always to new beginnings and incessant new beginnings lead to sterility. Mr. Stephen's work is concerned with a single great subject, the relation of human imagination to the real world. But what I most prize in his poetry is its flexibility and inclusiveness. Mr. Stephen's instrument is so subtle he can say almost anything and embody almost any contradictions. The basic tone of his poetry is meditation, yet he can pass in a single line from playfulness to grandeur. One of the major voices of our time, Mr. Wallace Stevens. At the end of finding what will suffice, it has not always had to find. The scene was set, it repeated what was in the script. Then the theatre was changed to something else. Its past was a souvenir. It has to be living, to learn the speech of the place. It has to face the men of the time and to meet the women of the time. It has to think about war and it has to find what will suffice. It has to construct a new stage. It has to be on that stage. And like an insatiable actor, slowly and with meditation, speak words that in the ear, in the delicatest ear of the mind, repeat exactly that which it wants to hear, at the sound of which an invisible audience listens, not to the play, but to itself, expressed in an emotion as of two people, as of two emotions becoming one. The actor is a metaphysician in the dark, twanging an instrument, twanging a wiry string that gives sounds passing through sudden rightnesses, wholly containing the mind, below which it cannot descend, beyond which it has no power to rise. It must be the finding of a satisfaction, and maybe of a man skating, a woman dancing, a woman calming the poem that, the mind. Large spur is various and is known by the rabbit head like Corolla. Verbamon is a big, pusty flower, or rather a leaf with a spicy smell. Mindy neck, I must remember. It is a vigorous flower with a dry, old-fashioned goodness of smell. It looms at the top of the stem, although the rest is covered in little galaxies which assist in sturdy appearance. Poppins are misquisite. The last one I held was the color of a princess's cheek, although they are generally a fiercer scarlet. The last breath of rain shimmers over them at the impression impossible to say no. They are shows. The foliage, this time of year, reminds me of the countryside around Redding when I was a boy. I must have spent half my youth wandering over those mountains, learning how to see them. I think that's a good idea. Too many obstacles to contend with. Of course, Holly, but what I mean is that there are obstacles for us personally. You know that. I'd just like to meet my grandmother someday, from you and others. I could take you outside New York City. I hiked all that area as a young man too. Undercliff, Tentafly, Spite and Dival. It's not the same. Well, there must be lots of other things I could share with you. There are many possibilities right here in Hartford. There must be something. Don't you care? Of course I do. I care for all of those people in a way that is natural for them and for me. My father was a difficult man. You must understand this. He didn't want what you might think of as love. He wanted something else. It was as if there was a window open every time he was in the house, letting the cold in. He liked it that way. As for your uncles, they and I just enjoy a friendly rivalry and competition. That's how we assert that we stand alone. I don't want to talk about this stuff. I just want to get to know you better. Well, sure. That shouldn't be necessary. You already know me as well as anybody ever has. I hope that isn't true. I really do. Well, you don't think I can fight in Bill Williams this way, do you? You don't think I gossip with Mary Ann Moore about the tensions between your mother and my family? Those people are your closest friends. Well, at least your closest correspondence. I'd assume they know something about you. You shouldn't be concerning yourself with my problem. You're off to college soon. You should be telling me all about your big plans for yourself. My big plans are to go over to Donnas after these chores. Beyond that, I expect we'll go to the movies later and possibly be so bold as to get something at the diner. No. I want you to be thinking bigger than that. I want to think bigger than that, too. I really do. Wonderful. Do you think that I could be at least somewhat intriguing or mildly charming or moderately charismatic on my own? Blessing is life. I'm a much simpler person. A far less significant. Don't say such things, your mother. It's not a far less significant. I guess it all just gets me confused sometimes. I keep thinking I don't know these people and that makes me wonder if I know myself. Listen, let me tell you something. From years, people have been asking me the same thing. Over and over. How can you be a poet and an insurance lawyer at the same time? They pose this question as though it's going to lead directly into my essence. Do you know what I tell them every time? That this is not a revealing question, like any stretch of the imagination. It wouldn't be revealing in the case of Charles Ives or Archibald McLeish. It wouldn't be revealing when Sir Francis Bacon and his thought were revealing with me. What are you saying, Dad? I'm saying that those friendships you were asking about, they're meaningful because those people understand me without explanation. People like Bill and Marianne, they don't need any confession from me because they took my work. They see the real me and they see it because they exercise their vision. Not because I make myself into some mathematical formula for them to tabulate and that's as much justification as I feel I need make even with my only child. It's not to get to know you, Dad, the way they want to. It might be important to them. I'm sure it's a right to be pen-passed with an enigma but it's not so much fun to rake up the leaves with one. What are you two doing out here? How can you gab a way like this with our garden and not our disarray? This is nothing to get upset about, Elsie. It's merely a few leaves under the trees from which they fell. These leaves spoil my D&T buses entirely, Wallace. Completely. It's alright, Holly. You can go and join your friends. Finally. So are you pocket money in the drawer? Yes, you may take it and do as you wish. Well, I'd love to finish our conversation, Holly. Can't now, Dad. I've got big plans. Oh, I almost forgot this, dear. We need to agree on a time that reported from the current to drop right. He insists on a photo of the two of us. Oh, no, no, Wallace. I can't do that. Well, we're talking about nothing more than a pop-in on your part. Elsie, just for the sake of appearances. I can't be photographed looking as I do these days. I won't. I have no intention to. You don't have to tell a man about headache that day. It's entirely possible. I'll have one anyway. There's no need for reluctance, dear. Don't you remember what a beauty you were when you were younger? I remember being told that was a beauty. Well, you were. You know, you were so enchantingly immortalized you on the mercury dime. Your image will circulate with those silver wings forever. And you could still be that beguiling muse if you wanted to. You let your hair down again, Elsie. You know the problem with being beautiful. It attracts all kinds of people to you. Sometimes it's the wrong kind. Oh, I see. And what would be the right kind? I'd like to know where others have succeeded when I might have failed. That is what you would say to me, isn't it? I have no other to think about that, Elsie. I never saw the point in tormenting myself. It's hoo-hoo-hoo. It's shoo-shoe-shoe. It's crick-a-nick. It's envious catnation. Dapro sounds upon the roof while you practice arpeggios. It is because they carry out the stairs, body and rags. You see that at the piano, that lucid souvenir of the past, the diver tormento, the unclogged concerto, snow is falling, strike the piercing chord of the voice, not you. Down is the great wind howling by the charo placating. The voice of that besieging agon, weave. It was young. Besieged thou. Just a minute, am I reading this right? You've got, see, the blind and the lame of clay, they're on the summer lawn. She, with her graceless eyes of clay, quick as a threatened fawn. I didn't write that. Argerius wrote that. Yes. But Argerius is you, Wally. As long as you, uh, jump his town. I'm just trying to fill up these pages. Let me, if you care to dash off a few more ballads of higher quality, be my guest. Running and tripping into his way, whose legs are gone? Please, I still have a few more for you. Oh, I can't wait. But we'll... Hillary Harness has me. No! Let me give you public some advice! Poetry is to woo women. And we all know that it is never, never allowed the poetry to contain you from the look that you've ever seen. Poetry! This whole place is lousy with the poetry. What are you all about, Erisburg? I don't understand how frank this fuck is. Can't you hear it? Giggling of ignorant lippians rippling down the streets and uptrend by its poets. Can you understand me? Am I speaking too plainly? Poetry! I don't call myself a poet until I've at least been to Paris. And I seduce my way worth of living exploits to versify. What do you ever say to that, Stevens? Have you a rondo and r- Eris, you know that. Well, then drop your quill and run to the nearest poet. I don't have the funds for that now. No, no, no, that never stopped a real poet. A real poet can bend a material word to his will by sheer- Okay, then I'll talk with Posey Stevens. We'll make it to Paris in due time. I have to pat him there myself, but not at the end of the night, because tonight, gentlemen and partners- Pappy is wrapped in all the square and our ship is sailing by! Even to get there we're taking stabs at any fine young lass's present. Even there, civil-gage Stevens, you hear that? I stick no blame on civil-gage. Oh, rather bold subversion of the truth. I am aware of Miss Gage. I find her pleasant. I have no designs on her. Who is this civil-gage anyway? Oh, I think you know Miss Gage, she's Miss Unsinkable Burnettin. She skips past the jury boarding house daily, liver-dealing after an attack. Yes! Finish this. Come on. Take a profound research. Don't tell me you're too irredeemably industrious too, and we're talking nuclear-mit-tricking, literally this evening, at rapidly intoxicating suffragettes. Yup, it's okay, and I will finish this up. You'll meet us later? I'll be there just as soon as I'm done. So wall-y. I will give up on you. No matter how hard you make it on me, I'll make you my offers of decency, and so you're finally debauched enough to receive them. Just remember that, my good arch-headed friend. The state of dissipation will win. You can say it's Miss Gage, the civil, if I may call you that. You know, Mr. Stevens, I've heard a story about a woman who was being pursued by a rather smitten admiral. She wanted to see what he was made of, so she took a flower and innocuous, nearly weightless rose and laid it elegantly on her shoulder. Then she challenged him to knock it off. She told this suitor if he could perform this simple action he'd earn the privilege of at least one rendezvous with her where he might speak for himself. As if I were some Gibson girl to be played like a carnival game, as if I'd swoon at some silly man's bravado. On the other hand, the old-fashioned gallantry still appreciates the man who can assert himself. Would you like a chance to win me, as we have our prize? Long time. I'm Couchier de Bonne. My name is Mabouji Etante, and I'm here to make my CV, and I'm going to cover it. Lassie? Is that you? I'll be back down in a moment here. I'm organizing my notes. I'll be back. Get it, get it. No, no! Such a socratease of snails. Musician of pairs, Principium and Lex. Same quieture. Is this same weight of things, this naked confated pedagogue, preceptor to the sea? Crispin, at sea! Oh, the personal apology of self, blotched out the almost-gotten. Crispin, the ludicrous disease that may have sustained the living stick, the bell-ringed leeches clumped in China, campus spain, inquisitorial mobs, and general exo-barber from Utah, they bring reinforce, bowing their lives to self, asking the same. Crispin, at sea, at sea, war, unsoundly shout out from his temper, near what thoughts, and chains affecting his future pride, and what despondency set to perish with. Thus, you can see if his voyaging to be an up-and-down between two elements, fluctuating between some... Crossing seas to find in one laconic rage, laid bare, the whole shebang. The second chance of it! Don't you ever stay away from me for that long again. Of course not, mother. In fact, I was going to say, you look younger somehow. It is so good to have you home. Oh, Wallace, your father would like to speak with you before we eat. Apparently, there is something you and me must work out before dinner. But I want you both seated for the chicken pudding. Don't make me call you. Let me enjoy the moment. I do feel I've earned it. You tested me, son. You know that? You tested me when you bounced from the post to the Tribune, and then once I'd finally gotten you into law, misfiring with eating and loose, and then burning that bridge with lightning and war. Oh, there were so many missteps along the way. But now! Now, I think, you've finally found your niche. Haven't you? Pat! Remember? When we used to call you that. And then, heat, heat. Let me relish this to give you credit for making such an unorthodox move an insurance company. As a fellow attorney, it never would have occurred to me, but I realize this is a savvy way to play to your strengths. And there's no need to deny it. Hive your weaknesses. I just want to know, will this be the one? Have we finally found the position in which you'll apply yourself at long last? Can I count on you for that? Take that as a yes. I'll take that as a promise that there'll be no more of your disappointments. All right. Your brothers and sisters are waiting. Garrett Jr., Elizabeth, Mary Catherine, everyone's here. What are you waiting for? Can we talk about something? For a moment. It's about this position that I've been offered. I was thinking, Father, if we just as you said, it could lead to an entirely new life. Precisely, hence my excitement. But what if I didn't choose that life after all? What if I pursued something else for myself? I see. And what would that be? A literary life. I could try writing again. I could write the papers like before, but poetry, like I always wanted. I could take time to see Europe. Finally, I could go to Rome and I could say, I could speak French in France and to write about it. What's the aim that you would decline this offer and go willingly back into the ranks of the unemployed? I am sane. I grow eagerly among the poets. That is merely a matter of semantics, Wallace, because the poets and the unemployed are one and the same. One is a code word for the other. Pardon me, I don't wish to lose my composure, but you know, I've been pushed to the limits of my patience. There are professional poets in the world, Father. Perhaps in the world, Wallace, but not in our world. We have to work for the things we get, son. Work, work, work, work. That hammer away. That's the path prescribed for us. What if I was not meant to hammer away like that? If you smile at me, if you are. Garrett Jr. has never been able to do it. Garrett Jr., I will concede, doesn't have the stuff that you do. Elizabeth married an old man in the government so she could oppose. Elizabeth was not given the same opportunities you were watching. I wasn't able to send her to Harvard and the New York Law School, like I was with you. And that's precisely because of the expense of paying for Harvard and the New York Law School that paid for Carl Isle and Penn for your brothers. It's because of the debt that I slammed myself into running my own firm, managing my bicycle platform of my boys, not one other than sober-faced John the Sum degree has shown any attention on taking the pit in his teeth. Never mind, lightning my low-day of crystal. Okay. I can see that this is all too much for you. I'm trying to hold this. It's not all too much for me and even if all were too much, I'd certainly never admit that because this is simply the way things are. Life is boring. A duty and responsibilities, wives and families. Will you plan to put it all off? Listen to me, son. You know, I dabble in firsts myself. I cherish you, I do. It's not to be taken seriously by a real professional. It's unseemly somehow, effeminate in some way, ladylike. We're not out for a picnic. This campaign is one of reality and it depends on initiative. Each of us on his own. One thing, half the other, fully neither. It doesn't matter what the percentages are. Only that when they are added up, you are a man. No, you're right, father. It's better that I stand on my own. Paulus? No, no, you're right, father. It's time to start forestalling it all. It's inevitable. What are you saying? You're going to turn around and go right back to New York? Your mother will be devastated. Tell mother. I won't end it up like that. Pair of things, though. Pair of things, not fruit. You must have more urgent matters than the typing of your script, please. I would argue that these men are very urgent, Mrs. Baldwin. What business of this institution? To my personal business, which exists on a continuum with my business as a part of this institution. So yes, Mrs. Baldwin, I would hope that after all this time together you would still cling to this facile notion that one vocation is irreconcilable with the other, as I've said before. It makes no sense to see the man and not the shadow that he casts. It is a key to see them both as a single and unified. Is that my shipment from Mr. Vidal? It's hardly our most pressing sale. Oh, boy. If you won't, Mrs. Baldwin, I will make the pro-reparation. I can fathom any degree of irony imaginable. Now, Mrs. Baldwin, if you would locate the peach-infused variety, if you would, I'm highly recommended with a cube of jaggery. This doesn't know about it, but yet there's someone who will know it. Either way, you're struck with all these knick-knacks here. You're a little left-bank junk-chomp. Mrs. Baldwin, do you intend ever to extend to me the respect to which I'm entitled perhaps on the day that I am a promoted Vice President? Oh, I suspect I'll be too Greek-greeker to worry about your feelings on that day, sir. And as you so often say, so many of our other executives would have to die for that to be the case. Now, really, can I have an update on the bill in this account? Mark, urgent. I resolved that matter yesterday. A sizable potential to account? If I'm Kentucky, it's already approved. Please, while you haven't heard about this yet, the board has just requested a full inventory of each department's problems by... The surety claims the department has no problems. You may report that with confidence. We should at least get back to them a pretty bottle. Mrs. Baldwin, please. Tea of this caliber must be consumed at the perfect temperature. The great thing in Paris, I imagine, is to walk from one end to another in every direction and to partake of its life as I consider it to the most intense degree possible from the inside. It seems the only place left in the world in which notwithstanding our talk of war politics something gay and beautiful survives, I could imagine myself there seeing just what any Parisian would see. I'd laugh at my sleeve at New York, far on the bleak edge of the world. Both places aren't like, but there's a difference that is not to be bridged. Paris seems more than ever the center if there is a center anywhere. One of these days, when the different things on the way from Peking, Geneva, London, Mexico actually arrive, I shall have exhausted the possibilities of life within my scope. I suppose that the simplest cure for that would be to leave Hartford. Indeed, tonight, I'd like to be sipping a bottle under a plane tree and listening to Madam's Paris from out of Gascon. I suppose that if I ever go to Paris, the first person I will meet would be myself, since I have been there in one way for so long. What's your daughter's? My daughter? Yes, so she seems rather agitated, shall I show her? I can show myself then, Mrs. Baldwin, thanks. How are you doing here? Do you mean here in your office? I mean here in Hartford, aren't you supposed to be in Poughkeepsie now? I'm not just making idle conversation. What about your studies? The Japanese are blowing up Christmas trees. What does that have to do with you? What does that have to do with me? That's my question exactly. With everything going on, how should I be worried with the sonics from the Portuguese? No, you know what? I'm finished with all of that now. I'm ready to move on to real life. Let's just stop all this nonsense. I'm clear on my schedule. I'll take you back to school myself. How do you plan to do that exactly, Dad? Will you learn to drive finally, or will you walk me the hundred miles? You will not talk to me like that. I won't tolerate that from you. We'll finish this conversation at home. See what your mother has to say about all this. Dad, both know she won't have anything to add. I have asked you not to talk about her like that. Why do you think I came here in the first place? Because our report is so remarkable. I don't understand this at all. I thought you loved it at Vassar. I thought you were having a wonderful time there. No, Dad. Vassar was your idea, remember? You picked it. I had no choice whatsoever. So that's what this is about. You're angry because you weren't allowed to choose which privileged college your parents would send you to? Yes, it is, in fact, when you extrapolate from that to... Yes, thank you, Mr. Baldwin. Everything is perfectly all right. I'm sorry for the disturbance. Just give us a moment, please. The connections that I made at Harvard, the people that I met there, they were some of the brightest and best friends in my life. Walter Arensburg and Richard Binner, Pitt Sanford and Living Good. I think people opened up a whole new world to me. If Walter Arensburg hadn't come back to New York and found me there, then all sorts of things might never have happened. I might never have written anything serious, for example. And that's not the slightest exaggeration. But those are the advantages you get and the connections you make from attending a school like that. You don't get them by lying around your hometown with some simple repairman you insist on seeing who has nothing more to offer you than the tools on his dust. You talk as though we dominate your life completely. And in fact, we are the most permissive parents in your circle. Here I am practically begging you to study and paint and explore life without any adult commitment. Why would you resist that? How is that relevant to this discussion? I just want to know, why don't you speak to him anymore? I don't recall exactly. There was an awkward situation that arose and I was understanding. You mean there was a falling out? It resulted despite all of this value you placed on the man's friendship. No, but it wasn't intentional. It just happened. He froze up and then I froze up and I just never found a way out of my eyes. There you go. Is it that relevant somehow? It's been reduced to crashing these things. With ruffle air and more, it's been talking about the little brothers. You never should have moved back to revenue. I tried to worry about that. In a couple of days every now and then I remind myself of why I left. In the first place, that much is okay. Anything more? And I start longing for my rakish life in the city. I tell you, my old friend, the sheer violence one feels as a bachelor in New York is staggering. The contrast between our two extremes now is striking. How, really, well, how are things going? I'm moving over to American Bonding. When I get back they tell me it's a step up. How about the poetry? Is the goddess of sturdy? You cover your new muse? You know what's been writing lately? Bitter. Is that so? I got a letter from him. From China, of all places. He's working on a book of verses of guests who may be publishing it. Ehrensburg! Yes! Bolter is still out of tune! He had news on a simple two, by the way. We've been around here. So who? Who can it be? Wally. You really don't want to know? Let me see if I can guess. This gage married a friend of her father approved by some plan of predestination at a stop in the Mayflower. Her new name is Bradford. Or Goodman. And she now resides in a stately town home on Beacon Hill. Close. Really? I was a friend of her uncle. He was a lawyer or something. But in California. Is she teaching, maybe? That's all I recall. Thank you. Thank you for reminding me of that entire stuff. Oh, I'm sorry. Wallace. You mean to dredge anything up? Come on. Don't get reflective now. See that? That girl there? It's Miss Elsie Mall. Or she's also known as Elsie Catchall. Queen of her latest beauty pageant. It says that wouldn't be self obvious. And not a half bad word word from what I've heard. Now, you may wonder about those surnames. In fact, there could be a story there. Maybe some problem with a parentage, or maybe that's just how they do things on their side of the tracks. All I know is, I could forget a whole lot of whispering for a face like that. You know what I mean? Hello? Miss Mall? Ed Livinggood? We have a fork. Is this right? No, I come back from Harvard. Set up my own successful practice, and still, these women are too good for me. Come on off me, sing one. Oh, yeah! No, no, no. You act between a girl and a soul, willing to step forward, Mr. King. You seem salivated. You seem so forthright a moment ago. Hey, hey, hey. I know that one. Do you? Yeah, in fact, I do. Forward and back. Who would you be, sir? I am Wallace Stevens from New York. From New York! Oh, yeah! We're off to State Park. Oh! We're kissing. Come take a trip to my airship. Come take a trip to my airship. Come take a trip to my airship. Come sail away to the stars. We'll travel to Venus. We'll sail away. No one will see what we're kissing. Come take a trip to my airship. Come take a trip to my airship. Miss Mom. Oh, no. Did you? What? Well, you seem as well as anyone I've seen in New York. As of late. Probably. Probably better. Thank you, Mr. Stevens. Do you go to the theater often? Yes, I do. Are you fond of it too? As much as I can be. What are the chances of you being in New York? Anytime soon. I would be happy to escort you to a show. Yeah. Please don't misunderstand me. I was merely saying if you happen to be in the city. I mean to say anything. It's okay, Mr. Stevens. I didn't think that you did. How about this, Miss Mom? I could write you from New York. Just to get us started, I could write you poetry. If you'd like. You know, I once intended to be a poet before my life took its root. I've been meaning to start again. Don't worry about how it would look. I wouldn't want anyone to get the wrong idea. Well then, you just be careful. You'll just be our little secret. Now it is September and the web is woven. The web is woven and you have to wear it. The winter is made and you have to bear it. The winter web, the winter woven, win and win. The thoughts of summer that go with it. In the mind. Pupa of straw. Muppet of rags. It is the mind that is woven. The mind that was jerked and tufted and straggled in thunder and shattered sun. It is all you are. The final dwarf of you. That is woven and woven and waiting to be worn. Neither as mask nor as garment but as a being. Born from insipid summer for the mirror of cold sitting beside her lamp for the citrant and nibble and coffee dribble frost is in the skull. But Dejean such modernity and force. The same shock as his cologne. We could always ask the artist who is just in the next week as long as most peacefully I tell you, I don't know how Walter managed to come back from the continent with that one. Actually, I do with a deep excavation of his trust. Am I in your way, sir? No, no, no, that piece demands sustained attention. Take your time. I've been introduced every Dr. Bill William Carlos Williams as I also know. He's full. Are you LC students? Why? It's wonderful to meet you. I've heard so much about you from your husband. Have you? Yes, of course. In fact, where is our giant? I thought I heard him just now. Giant? You know, your Wallace is a bit of a hero among our smug little coterie. He's the only one to congratulate when we're all done congratulating ourselves. Ha ha ha ha! I don't know the man who's been out for all. He could be the stodgiest dandy I've ever met and the worst self promoter since Galileo. I told him, wow! Enough of rogue and those other obscure misalets for Christ's sake. Let's find you a proper publisher before you're any closer to 40. You must think I'm horrible. It all comes from a place of deep and abiding respect. It's alright. I don't claim to like all of my husband's writing. I'm more impressed with his work at the office. Is it the lack of imagist precision that bothers you? Or is it his indifference to world affairs? I'm not sure. I don't know. I find it showy sometimes. Showy? So pretentious, nonsensical to tell you the truth. Oh, I agree. I agree that the poems can be obscure. Ha ha ha! Steve? Oh, in fact, I have just a moment to go, Mrs. Stevens. I can't tell you how thrilled we are that you could join us in such long glass. We were beginning to wonder whether you were trying to unprocess my text. Well, Bill, did you know that I read that Mrs. Stevens' husband was not long ago. He was still rhyming breeze with trees like a schoolboy. It was as if humism had never winded its way across the ocean to find him. And I asked him, Wally, what if you would do it since your Harvard days? And he said, insurance. And I said, insurance, dear lord, Wally, we've got to put you back into the business of risk. I tell you, it's like becoming tired of the baroness again. Apparently, she'd been misinformed and she'd been disinherited by her senile benefactor. And after hearing this, the sign had been scratched her wrists with a tube of lipstick. And then she passed over the bathtub where she was captain of the arresting skips. By the hand of Mr. Menrein, now she's awoken, caught a glimpse of them in Delo caricature. And he drowned herself when you were about to see her. And to the moment that it served, what stood erect in you has withered a little palm tree of turned wood and forms your spontaneous core in its immeutable production. Well done. Delo caricature, Ms. Morse, such complete integration. Thank you, Mr. Sears. Thanks, Mr. Falkensbox. Get the box, even my own stoppages. Yes, compliment. I wasn't able to catch all of it, Menrein, but what I did hear was selective free of distortion. Ms. Morse, have you met my wife? No, I haven't. This is Mrs. Kelsey Stevens. Ms. Morse is a five-fourth and most original and truthful today. Nice to meet you, Ms. Morse. Nice for me as well. Please. What's your name? Hey, you are my wife. He most certainly is Mary Bareless. This is his wife right here. Right here? Steve, what did she write to you? What did she pass? Falkensbox. Now see, it's a wonderful companion. How can that be? No, no, no. Bareless really must leave. The Stevens is in love now. Mrs. Stevens, you must understand that we're drinking trouble. It's all right. We do have some interest to do here at the salon, but of course, we observe the court. That is correct, Mrs. Stevens. No more saying that. Four in a bed at a time. That is four in addition to me. Really? This new show, I was only kidding. Never told me you were married once. I most certainly did, Ms. Von Freitegloren over numerous times. But that can be true. It is quite true. And very happily, Elsie and I have been together for many years now. I simply cannot believe. Mr. Ehrensburg, perhaps it's time for another recitation. Mr. Ehrensburg. Yes, what a wonderful idea, Ms. Marianne. A wellness, why don't you come over here and make something pleasant for your wife? Yes, of course, I would be happy to. As you know, I have written many poems under Elsie's inspiration. Before she joined me here. This particular piece of verlier is from a more recent series. It is entitled, Bantams in Pinewoods. Chieftain if you can, a calf tan of tan with henna hackles. Hot. Damn universal cock. As if the sun was black or more to bear your blazing tail. Fat, fat, fat, fat. I am the personal. I am your world. Your world is you. You ten-foot poet among inchlings. Fat, be gone. An inchling bristles in these pines, bristles and points to appellation, tangs and fears not portly as can, nor his wounds. I am overly cryptic. So pading. Perfectly. Yes, this is awesome. Capsized. Yes, and now Mr. Duchamp, I did not understand. The man promises a poem about roostails. And he delivered us a poem about roostails. Verlust attention, Mr. Stevens. The title must create a crash as a rise that is in the harmony. Ha! And interesting and contentious. Contentious even. Mr. Stevens. What was your opinion? Oh, come now. All opinions are welcome here. If you must know. So affected it, and I don't understand why. I see. I found it ridiculous, in fact. I found this entire evening. Ridiculous. Well, well, well, Mr. Stevens, you must understand this. It's been quite unusual. Mr. Stevens, who could you possibly find ridiculous about this evening? I'll tell you what I find very ridiculous. It's not the gonions and new trenders. That is the fact that all of you attempt to characterize these triumphs with more words. I can think of only one way to get to the truth of what well as is expressed so economically. And that is with my body. My body was sliced through your verbiage and you saw the body get through the reflection of his ink and ink. Look at me and see your own glorious sight. Stop it! Stop it! I'm very sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry, everyone. This is New York Wallace. I want us to go back to running right away. There's too much of the past and your family and mine. The only trouble with my family is your family not worth doing for them. Am I just thinking about that? Irrespective of that, you can't leave here now. Things are finally starting to happen. It's my career and my poetry. I'm making a name for myself. Finally, after all this time, I won't stay here anymore. We'll see what the matter is. You don't know anything. Are you talking about that woman back there you saw for yourself? I did nothing to encourage her. I'm talking about your poems, Wallace. My poems. You told me you wrote those things for me. I told you I wrote some of them for you, that I started them for you. Oh, now you're sharing them and you're publishing them. What am I supposed to do? Other people are interested. You're ruining it. You know that. You're ruining all of that for me. Have you made no promise in the last years that you intend to keep? Is this really the life you want me to live? The life where I'm hidden at home while you're off doing despicable things with these horrible people? I'll go back to writing myself. Don't talk like that. Why shouldn't I? It's long overdue. Listen to me now. We may be able to move to the home office that's where many of the executives go. I'm Alexa Hartford Connecticut. But now, it must be now. It can't be. Now. These things take time. No. Now, boss. It has to be now. You tell them the moment you get back to work, you tell them you insist. You tell them there needs to be a change. The figure of a poet, a possible poet, cannot be cherry of tear traversing vacant space. Must have lived all of the last two thousand years and must have thought that Virgil, Dante, Shakespeare, Milton placed themselves in remote ages. We'll consider that although he has witnessed a general transition to reality, his own measure as a poet is his power to abstract himself and to withdraw into his abstraction the reality in which lovers' truth exist. We must be able to abstract himself and also to extract reality which he does by placing it in his imagination. He knows perfectly cannot be too noble a writer that he cannot rise up loftily in helmet, on the horse of imposing broads. Don Gioté will make it imperative for him to make a choice regarding the imagination and reality. We must now that it is not a choice one over the other but something such a recognition that here too the universal interdependence exists and hence his choice and his decision must be that they are equal the poet has his own meaning for reality and the painter has and the musician has in something to everyone so to speak. Reality is not that external sense but the life that is lived in it things as they are and beaded centuries. People are not going to dream of Babylonian here and there and old sailor drunk and asleep in his boots catch his tires in red weather. I am here Mrs. Baldwin quite clearly. You don't mind I prefer to gaze upon the ground. Crispin as rubber pure and capable to alter the lap Crispin slid from his continent by slow recess sounds correct but sedate as I hear it now Shall I proceed? Please. We'll see two more they say from this glass is Excuse me. Let's try it this way. We'll see two bray this dot dot dot writing with you little requiem writing Wait, wait, stay stay continue. Put the thunder of drums in baby the scarf. Today the tomtoms I think now harrowing blubber clump clump see Yes, and in the next section make ordinary quotidian make mundane quotidian and slip in pocket for dancing some place too Why can't we dance? Well, we can't do the last lot. Ex-checkering Mr. Dean Mrs. Baldwin Ex-checkering from Pible Ex-checkering you say I'm all fists? Are you feeling well today? I'm feeling quite well. In fact, I find my mind to be firing rapidly. Would you enjoy that? Who else would there be? Mrs. Baldwin Perhaps you need some rest? Yes, yes, yes. Perhaps a break from certain stresses and ready for a cold. What a man needs is the assembly of pastel water. Now I'll say this much. You said there's no hard life. No, thank you Arthur. I just wrote to my wife. I'm on a strict limit of one per night. I take away transcendence. I take away romanticism. I take away the hero. What is left? Only the fictions. To the fictions Arthur. To those benign illusions in which we still believe. Ah, Judge Paul. What the hell is he doing here? I'm just getting all together too literary. Judge Paul, thank you for having us. You invited me here? Indeed I did. You two boys, all the things. And Mr. Wallace Stevens I'm sure you know. Mr. Robert Frost. Of my reputation, certainly. I can't say I know his work very well. Come now, Mr. Stevens. I'm sure you've encountered something of it. Well, it's been a while since I picked up a Sunday of me post. Sorry, Judge Paul. Perhaps this wasn't such a good idea, ladies. Come on, Robert. Wallace is just a few drinks ahead of you. That's all. The latter ain't not a joint connection by the end of the evening. Come on, let's all have a cocktail together. Oh, well, I see you two boys got a lot in common. You both went to Harvard. You both live up in that land of no... With the common metaphor. Thank you, Mr. Stevens. Exactly how many drinks ahead is he? It's not the spirits that have me on in front of us. Oh, Stevens. Do you know what your problem is? You're an executive. You know what your problem is for us? You belong behind a baby buggy. You're a meta-positioned Wallace. Your poem must make my head hurt. Gentlemen, gentlemen, where are your manners? Behave accordingly. I'm sorry, ladies. We neglected you entirely. It's unconscionable behavior on our parts. Who am I to be? Well, I'm strictly an observer. Mr. Frost, biographer. That's how it's interesting. And you, young lady. I'm merely her friend, Dora. Oh, chat. You're traveling with a biographer for us? I am, Stevens. Don't you have water? It could be still a bit too underground for all that nonsense. You know, Robert, I used to look forward to coming down to Florida and having conversations like this one. It was just me and my old rummy pal or a couple of other baristas roughing it like soldiers. And you know what? I would rather sit around a fish camp, making corn liquor with them than talk about meter with you or about perspective that Dan Ernest Hemingway is crowding out of my little retreat as well as if I needed a sighting of Ernest Hemingway to believe that I'd rely on somebody special. Great. You'd better continue to read out just a hand. Oh, I shouldn't, I guess. What do you represent? If so, you can tell him that I'm not intimidated by his tales of safaris. You can tell him that I once spent a month in the Rockies eating nothing but what I shot and killed myself. You can tell him that he is not the only original man poet left. Good job, Stevens. What a nice old work to talk about. Oh, that was Ursula. You realize. What are we going to do? Ursula Hemingway. Now she's staying with her brother Ernest over on Whitehead Street no more than now. Oh, all right. Well, let's call this a night. No, the sun is barely setting. We'll do this another time, Robert. Oh, coffee and aspirin. Come on, let's go. You realize that you were having a pack of coons out out. It's just a copy boy from the Midwest. Say, was either of you a fellow semen in Oshka? You might be interested in the plot. It was supposedly around some gang of Russian crooks on the run. But I couldn't take my eyes off Garbo. Garbo, she's such a boncho. She's my favorite of them all, at least my current favorite. Stevens! Oh, no. I already so good to see you. Goddamn. I know you're an old man. Damn, you're a pretty big old man. But I can't let you run me down like that and upset my sister. I suppose we'll have to settle things the way writers do when they run out of work. I suppose we will. Just give me a moment to ready myself, Mr. Anime. Ready. What do you think you do? I'm going to dispense with this matador. He's a young man. Ballers look at him. You sure about this? I'm entirely sure. No, it wasn't Mr. Hanway. Oh, should we consider... Oh, I'd reconsider with an apology to me and my sister. Yeah, how about all this? I can't say I'm entirely opposed to that. First of all, I mean this sincerely. I had no idea who you were. My comments were entirely excusable and out of character. I am very sorry. Thank you, Mr. Stevens. Thank you for letting your heart to forgive me. Certainly, I most certainly can. Well, thank you, Mr. Hanway. Thank you very much. Very nice, Mr. Stevens. Very nice. Is there anything else? I got nothing for the other one. That's it! Come on, come on, come on! Come on, man, the letter's here! It's enough, but... Goodbye, your time, Judge. Boy, boy, this is absurd! Mr. Hemingway, I should mention that a great admirer of your prospectus goes from me, Mr. Stevens. Your command! Don't waste time in mystification, Mr. Hemingway. Boy, break into the cold truce, do you, sir? I don't know what you're saying, but you're saying it with authority. The snake has left its skin upon the floor. The tea-west sank downward under massive clouds and sores and greens spread over the scene. The moon is at the masthead and the past is dead. Her mind will never speak to me again. I'm free. Her mind had bound me round and the palms were hot as if I lived in ashen ground, as if the leaves in which the wind kept up its sound from my north of cold whistled in a sepulchral south. Her south of pine went coral and coral I'd seen. Her home, not mine, in the ever-freshened keys. Her days, her oceanic nights, calling for music for whispers from the reefs. How content I shall be in the north to which I sail and to feel sure and to forget the bleaching sand, to stand here on the deck in the dark and say farewell and to know that that land is forever gone and that she will not follow in any word or ever again you thought except that I loved her once. Farewell. I'm going to stop Wallace. When can I expect a change with anything having to do with us? I thought we were doing better lately. I was thinking that on a flight home. We just know how to avoid each other better. It's not the same thing. No, Elsie, you just wanted to acknowledge my efforts. I've been trying even if you haven't. You've been trying. You've been trying. Listen to this. Listen to this. Your yes, her no, your no. Her yes. The words make little difference from being wrong and wronging her if only as she... Wasted in what would be an ultimate waste that you are innocent still leaves you in the wrong. No, it doesn't Wallace. It refers to our private life, doesn't it? True you may love, and she have beauty of kind, but such unhappy love reveals vast blemishes. What is all this, Wallace? Why do you want to tell people these things? I'm not telling anybody anything that's poetry. Elsie, people know it's not a lot of poetry. You can still try harder. Find a way to get along. Why Wallace? Why? Why did we ever... Why did we do this to each other? Because we love each other in our way. We must be thankful for that. We have to recognize that we've committed to living our lives together. Things may not ever be perfect between us, but we can still be decent and loyal. We're a part of each other after all this time. I've... I've tried. I'll see all these years I've tried. I've never given up. I never will. Why don't you sit with me now? Let's talk and still do that. We used to spend so much time just talking with each other. I remember the right more than any talking myself. Our extended long distance courtship. Wasn't that extended? Far too long, Wallace. Far too many years of me and Reading and you in New York sending me letters and letters. So many letters and so little real but it was excruciating. You know just how I felt about it. You shouldn't bring these things up and expect to hear other advice. You're right. I'll see. I just had one point of view but I won't argue with you. I do remember you talked to me about comedy somewhat excessively. Did I? I don't know what you mean. I mean when we were first together whenever the type of theater came up what was comedy you went on about? I think you may be remembering I've got quite a bright idea. It was probably Comedia I was talking about. What? Comedia del Octave. It's an Italian form from the 16th century. It consists of these slapstick sketches they're called lazzi performed by these madcap characters with masks. It was fascinating for some reason I don't know the broadness of what you'd call comedy per se at least not in the modern sense. I see. Thank you for correcting me on it. That's not what I meant. I wasn't trying to correct you. Why didn't you tell me what really happened with your hand while I was honestly there? I fell down if I was there. No. Tell me what really happened when you drunk. Did you embarrass yourself again? No. No, it was nothing like that. That's all. Running with the bulls. I'm sorry you had to hear that, Collin. It's never okay. It's never okay. Hope you know that. Not for you, and certainly not for the baby. Quiet most of the time. Just saying that you should live somewhere peaceful. I didn't think of Peter growing up with all that bitterness. Well, we're working on that. That's our goal as soon as I have enough saved up. I help you with that. I could speak things along if you like. Do you want us to go? Is that it? Do you really want us out of you that bad? No, no, of course that's not. It's been wonderful having you and Peter here with us truly. Well, I couldn't accept any money from you. You made it clear what you wanted from me a long time ago. I knew your expectations from the start. It doesn't have to be that way. What way? So severe between us. I could change. I could be better for you now. So that whatever happened to you with your separation or what have you, it wouldn't happen again. What are you talking about, Dad? You didn't have anything to do with that. I put a great deal of pressure on you. I realized that. It wasn't your fault. You were the one warning me. No, I should have supported you in whatever way you needed. I know that now. I know that now. No, I'm quite well. Fine. I'm not young anymore, of course, but I'm more productive than I've ever been. I've had all the recognition, all the prizes and awards I could ask for more than I could ask for. In fact, more attention than I'm comfortable with. I've been thinking about my private affairs and I'd like to see some things change. I'd like things to be different between us. Like when you were younger and you were close. So, what do you say? I saw a grand apartment house on my walk home the other day close enough for regular visits. What do you say? You want to take a look? Of course, I mean it. It wasn't always like this, you know? We were almost so good. Like, when we had you we'd take you to the park, remember? Princess Wamsa Pertail and you'd whistle birds songs. I don't know. I'd like to see you go from the horse because you were fearless with that. But, I remember all that. And in a few years, we can take Peter there and you'll be the one to remind him. That's across boundaries. And that's Elizabeth Park just down the way there. We can go there every day if we want. Wallace, this is much more what I hoped for. Now that we're settled, I feel so much better. Wallace, thank you. I've seen him so glad to hear you say that. You need to thank me. I should thank you for insisting on your transfer from leaving all your friends in New York for all of them. Thank you, buddy. You're welcome, Wallace. If I was any closer to you, I'd be on the other side here. Marry me and I'll never look at another horse. You are crazy. What could I say? My little rosecap loves me or hate me. I was born to play the fool. Is that really what you think of yourself? In fact, I do think that. Even if no one else does, I always have. I want you to get a harlequin and you are my tricky conbina. Come to my flower. Let me shake your tambourine. I'll change the column of blue guitar. And they said, but they must and to be honest give ourselves a tune of a new guitar of exactly as they are. Oh, that's life. Wait, wait, wait. But you're not my doctor. C. Williams. Still registered in the state of New Jersey. But you are not my doctor. This is not New Jersey and I'm not your attorney. I'll make you deal with this. You give me your recommendation on a certain live case I have pending and I'll tell you my opinion on this prognosis here. I don't need your opinion on this little round down. That's all. Just sign me out of here already. I can get back to the office and quit wasting all this time. I'm missing a VP's meeting today. It's important to me. You don't know what it took to get into that group. It's obvious for that. What's important is the other group that you've burned your way into. Our group. And no amount of condolences can revoke your standing with us. You must rest now. My strictest orders the suits will be happy to exploit your genius when you get back to that insurance bar and I promise you. Do you really need to get up? No, no, no. I've maybe done a few vitamins but I'm still not Bob Frost. What do you do in here? I'm just in town for a reading tonight. Trinity College. Yes. Another honorary degree for the staff. Not too shabby for the Wednesday but what I'm really doing here is I have a bone to pick with you, Wally. I'm just trying to gauge if you can withstand my withering attack. I can take it. I don't think you're fit for it. I can take anything you can dish out on the brink of death I could. I don't think you could. I wish you could. Speaking of one part to another I've been bottling up some rather precise metaphors for my victory all for weeks now. But now I look at you I'm not sure. You disappointed both of us on so many levels. You disappointed you didn't tell me my old friend. You disappointed you didn't want me here with you. You disappointed to learn you still won't take me into your confidence after all this time. You know I would have liked that. I always wished we'd become closer. Does this have anything to do with that preface you asked for? What? The insult that it contains? The insult? That works for weeks of that damn thing. You worked for weeks to depict me as an abject thing. How do you come to that conclusion? You call my entire poetic flawless anti-poetic. I use that term as a compliment. I didn't take it as a compliment. I've been trying to be poetic my whole life. It's just tribute. I use my time and energy so I'm going to scat time and energy I have left. Sanitize me in my own collective poems. Anti-poetic. You think that's bad. Mr. Stevens presents an excellent example of poetry that is untruthful and nauseating to read. 1916. I can remember it as if it were yesterday. One cannot feel that well those is an important poet. Plain and simple. 1938. I still see the type set when I close my eyes. Attentive, superfine, and perverse and he will never be popular. Flippant, incoherent, self-mocking, unserious, un-American. Mr. Williams is not only a poet but a man who having lost his footing now scrambles to stand up and keep his back. Ah yes, he always did feast. No politics didn't there. No, no. One of these days, Bill, you're going to have to quit worrying about how people perceive it. Well when do you claim to learn that particular lesson? Not too long ago actually, but I did learn it. I may surprise you to hear this, but most of my life I felt certain that I couldn't help but fail people one way or another. I lived in constant fear of that. Of course you know the literary contingent. They read my poems and then they marvel at how such if feat works could have been produced by such an oversized burger was as if they felt that I'd failed them and betrayed them by not being the real estate that they've had in mind. And then on the other hand was the executive branch whom you don't know. They'd be dumbstruck to find one of their trifling with such a girlish hobby as a verse I could feel them wondering how I could risk being seen as a dandy, sissy, a heatheness to fight. And by all accounts I was cerebral detached I was a new man incapable of warmth or feeling I felt I had to prove myself to them to all of them, and to you Bill except that I never could answer the preliminary question which was prove myself as what? Was I the man among men or was I the dainty road the effeminate fraud that occupied me for many years until I finally decided to prove anything 20. I was a massive contradiction and everybody else would just have to come to terms with that and all I could do was view the world through my blue glasses. Well I can't argue with the word of that well I can but in view of your condition I want just better already will you give me a chance to come back here and visit you. So nice to see you though. Oh Bill I'll try to Bill. Did you know that your father once wrote a poem in my honor? No I didn't it wasn't in his honor it was an homage one might say it was a parody a dismantling it was a kind of copy he took four lines that I wrote and then he expanded on them with all due credit noted it was a set up it was a work of great ambition and by view from the true honors of my life nuances and theme by Williams from my el hombre it's a strange courage you give me ancient star shine alone in the sunrise toward which you lend no part shine alone shine shine like bronze it reflects and in my face nor any inner part of my being shine like fire it mirrors nothing lend no part to any humanity it suffuses you in its own light be not kind mirror of morning half map half star be not an intelligence like a widow's bird or an old horse lovely absolutely lovely she wanted to be here though she really did you shouldn't have to go back and forth like this there's no life for you I don't mind nobody has age he's only eight he thinks the whole thing's exciting besides you know Peter Dorsi he was the greatest enabler that wouldn't happen to be my latest box of imports would it I don't know I thought it might have been something this is Baldwin sent along from the office she thought it might cheer you up this is Baldwin who always was a great figure candy violet petals you can't let them sit too long I get these from a confectioner in the sixth of a run these small I think they're any good you can smell them through the box they're going to retire me if I don't get back to the office soon a little note arriving won't hold me up forever that bullets are my eyes you know the Hartford's really strict about such things dad they're never going to part with you in your conversation besides I think you should retire you could travel like you always talked about you could finally go to Paris yourself no Holly I couldn't do that yes you could when you go together no Holly listen to me I couldn't go to Paris anymore it's too late for that of course it isn't what I mean is that the real Paris could never match the Paris that I've built up in my mind all these years no matter how grand it could be I can only think about now how I've figured it all these years yeah I was saying something like this to Dr. Williams that just doesn't matter because I've finished becoming who I am at long last I'm happy about that it's one of the great advantages to be really old I'm like a puzzle that's finally acquired its last piece old you give that to young Peter there's a why all for me you can give it to him yourself when he's here no no no you do it I'm going to be sure to call him Joujou's or something okay dad I will not talk like this I'd like you to stay close to Elsie you understand me I know that she can be difficult but she's not impossible you just have to take your time learn what you can offer each other and just never stop trying promise me good I know I I never told you enough about my family I'm sorry for that you had every right to ask about that and I shouldn't have denied you you know that we were all very close when I was growing up my brothers and sisters my grandmother my parents there were such profound connections I never thought that we could break apart I can't help thinking of them my mother and father they must have felt when they reached this point where I am now you shouldn't be talking like this you should be thinking your positive thoughts no no no this is positive it feels good to think back on them after all this time and you should know that I never blamed your mother for her hostility towards them I never thought she was good enough and they made sure that she knew that I can hardly blame her for resenting that but Elsie never knew my mother as I did she never saw her when I was young so fresh and doting so vigorous piano she never knew my father how hard he worked how sincere he was how how fragile and broken he became how distraught and he realized he didn't have enough money to send my youngest sister Elizabeth to college to Vassar that's where he always dreamed that she would go I was always so distraught thinking of them waiting for me to come and visit and me to stubborn to go home and now I can't tell you what I wouldn't give but just one more chance to embrace into that old house and hear my mother say there's my boy push my brothers out of the way I put a runner hand through my head those moments are gone I can't get them back nobody gets them back that's why we're so lucky to have found each other again doing that and why you must claim to your mother any way you can for as long as you can that's how it is that's all I have a farewell to an idea the mother's face the purpose of the poem fills the room they are together here and it is warm the house is evening half dissolved only the half they can never possess remains still starred it is the mother they possess she gives transparents to their present peace she makes that gentler that can gentle be and yet she too is dissolved she is destroyed she gives transparents but she has grown old the soft hands are a motion not a touch the house will crumble the books will burn they are at ease in the shelter of the mind farewell to an idea the cancellations the negations are never final the father sits in space wherever he sits of bleak regard as one that is strong in the bushes of his eyes he says no to no and yes to yes he says yes to no and in saying yes he says farewell there may be always a time of innocence there is never a place the oldest and coldest philosopher there is or may be a time of innocence as pure principle it is like a thing of ether that exists almost as predicate but it exists it exists it is visible it is it is so then these lights are not a spell of light a saying out of a cloud but innocence an innocence of the earth and no false sign or symbol of malice that we protect thereof lie down in my children in this coldness as if awake we lay in the quiet of sleep as if the innocent mother sang in the dark of the room and on an accordion half heard created the time and place in which we read