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A High-Toned Old Christian Woman
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Poetry is the supreme fiction, madame.
Take the moral law and make a nave of it
And from the nave build haunted heaven. Thus,
The conscience is converted into palms,
Like windy citherns hankering for hymns.
We agree in principle. That's clear. But take
The opposing law and make a peristyle,
And from the peristyle project a masque
Beyond the planets. Thus, our bawdiness,
Unpurged by epitaph, indulged at last,
Is equally converted into palms,
Squiggling like saxophones. And palm for palm,
Madame, we are where we began. Allow,
Therefore, that in the planetary scene
Your disaffected flagellants, well-stuffed,
Smacking their muzzy bellies in parade,
Proud of such novelties of the sublime,
Such tink and tank and tunk-a-tunk-tunk,
May, merely may, madame, whip from themselves
A jovial hullabaloo among the spheres.
This will make widows wince. But fictive things
Wink as they will. Wink most when widows wince.
Wallace Stevens
Read poems about / on: poetry, heaven, woman, women
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Beverly Scofield (1/15/2008 5:27:00 PM)
There's hardly anything left to say, except that Gary Witt has captured the essence of Stevens' poem. I'm slowly working my way through his poems. So far 'Sunday Morning' is on the top of my list of favorites, but this one is a keeper. Anyway, thanks, Gary, for such a great review. |
Gary Witt (11/18/2006 12:52:00 PM)
Damn but I love this poem. The voice starts out imperious and high-brow, and then degenerates into a burlesque of squiggling saxophones and disaffected flagellants in parade. It seems to travel from logic to emotion and back again, almost becoming a rant. I can see the woman who is being subjected to this monologue become more and more agitated. And then the last two sentences (“But fictive things/Wink as they will. Wink most when widows wince.”) show the mind behind the voice. She’s either got to walk away in a huff, or smile at the wink.
I also love the fact that this poem will send people straight to their dictionaries. So, let’s begin with a few definitions. A cithern is a stringed instrument similar to a mandolin. A peristyle is the interior courtyard or garden area of an ancient Grecian home. A masque is a stylized form of theater popular with European nobility in the 15th and 16th centuries. Flagellants were a Christian sect who believed they could purge themselves of sin through mortification of the flesh, by whipping themselves with various instruments. However, there are also some Shiite sects that practice flagellation. So, while in Stevens’ time the primary definition of muzzy was “hazy, clouded, or out of focus, ” it could also be a slang and derogatory expression referring to Muslims. While the latter brings a new dimension to the poem, and seems to be consistent with Stevens’ burlesque tone, I don’t know whether that definition was around at the time Stevens’ wrote the poem. One odd thing about this definition, though, is that is seems to be regional to Connecticut and New England, which is exactly where the vice president of the Hartford spent most of his later years.
On the one hand we have the Christian view of the cosmos, constructed from the “moral law” or ethos and ultimately converting the conscience into “palms, ” meaning (IMHO) something earth-bound but stretching toward “heaven.”
On the other hand we have a view of the cosmos (perhaps a Muslim view) constructed from the “opposing law, ” (perhaps the “natural law? ”) which converts our bawdiness, “unpurged by epitaph, indulged at last, ” into “palms.” Again, something earth-bound but stretching toward “heaven.”
Two different views of heaven, but palm for palm we are where we began.
So, allow, madame, that either view or both may be correct. Even though (or perhaps especially because) it makes you wince. |
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Wallace Stevens
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