The Labor of Poetry: Reading Ezra Pound and W.S. Merwin

I tend to read poetry way too quickly. So, this week I read aloud to slow down my reading pace. This method also proved valuable for appreciating the rhythm and the sounds of Ezra Pound’s poetry. However, reading became difficult as I stumbled over “Swartest night stretch over wretched men there” (Canto I).  Perhaps it was my embarrassing version of “grnnh! Rnnh, pthg” or the superscript lettering that made me give up (Canto IX).

Despite the struggles, I experienced the historical and biographical elements in a way skimming wouldn’t allow. I know only a (very) few references, but I felt intrigued by conflict, story, and characters. There is no particular emotion or sympathy involved; I only felt that the story is supposed to be exciting. I have no idea what is happening, yet Pound carries action into each line and stanza that kept me reading. It feels like reading Herodotus—laborious, yet filled with intriguing narrative.

The taxing length and breadth of The Cantos indicate Pound’s obsession with history and story. Truthfully, I am surprised that these poems are so long. It seems a poet who is obsessed with the “direct treatment of the thing” and concrete language should also favor shorter poems. He does follows his own advice by letting the lines of poetry flow and carry on to the next without the interruption of punctuation, but The Cantos seems a collision of concision (short lines) and breadth (historical events and use of several languages). Poems like “A Pact” tells me Pound relies on Whitman’s poetry; poems from The Cantos show me that Pound struggles to shed the tradition he depends on.

W.S. Merwin’s poem “Remembering” utilizes Pound’s rule of letting the lines in poems flow into the next without abrupt stops. This style appears in much of Merwin’s poetry, yet this particular instance evokes the continuous act of remembering. The poem ends with no punctuation, evoking a sense there is always something to remember. However, “Remembering” does not evoke the same anxiety and intensity felt in Pound’s Cantos. The speaker uses soft w and round a sounds such as “wands of auroras.”  Remembering history and historical figures is peaceful, emotive, and experiential for the speaker of this poem. 

The powerful emotive traits of Merwin’s poem compares more closely “The River-Merchant’s Wife: A Letter.” There is still story as the speaker experiences changes childhood into adulthood. The speaker says: “At fifteen I stopped schooling,/ I desired my dust to mingle with yours/ Forever and forever and forever. / Why should I climb the look out?” The speaker experiences desire and sorrow through the changes. The story and emotions come together through the vulnerability of the speaker. The images are familiar and have the potential to connect with readers, rather than losing them in a maze of historical references.

Remembering (1997) by W.S. Merwin

There are threads of old sound heard over and over

phrases of Shakespeare or Mozart the slender

wands of the auroras playing out from them

into dark time the passing of a few

migrants high in the night far from the ancient flocks
far from the rest of the words far from the instruments