Harmonium

Wallace Stevens is a poet's poet. His following is notable and many. The work he delivers in Harmonium is as much a collection of puzzles as it is poetry. He is undeniably clever.

I can actually dig this poet. He is a little out there. He is interesting and visual and abstract. I do not mind this at all and am grateful it goes towards helping the community as you can see inside the book the editor is acting very well to put proceeds toward people in need. So the whole production is positive and light. It is fun stuff. I cherish this.

Great reading. Totally satisfied.

Great book. Great Poet. Get the Collected Poems, where you will find all of the poems in Harmonium, and more.That being said, many of Stevens's most famous (and best loved) poems are here in Harmonium: Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird, The Snow Man, The Emperor of Ice-Cream, Sunday Morning, Anecdote of the Jar, ... and more.Here is the eighth stanza of "Le Monocle de Mon Oncle":Like a dull scholar, I behold, in love,An ancient aspect touching a new mind.It comes, it blooms, it bears its fruit and dies.This trivial trope reveals a way of truth.Our bloom is gone. We are the fruit thereof.Two golden gourds distended on our vines,Into the autumn weather, splashed with frost,Distorted by hale fatness, turned grotesque.We hang like warty squashes, streaked and rayed,The laughing sky will see the two of usWashed into rinds by rotting winter rains.

The lines sweep. The words captivate, fascinate and sometimes frustrate—brilliantly.It is in many respects a high-falootin’, Ivy-school-educated, Euro-pandering early-twentieth American version of sincere, poetic mystical vision. But, oh, does it sing.Difficult but rewarding. Harold Bloom not required.

Handy reprint of this first volume from Stevens. I believe it just entered into the public domain in 2019.

This is an amazing volume if you're into modernist poetry!

epochal work by a great poet.

I was generally luke warm as to the ambience of the poems. I did expect something different but that is my difficulty not the poet. As to what was there i find them sometimes forced or possibly too worked maybe they are a product of a great deal of erudition, but thats how it got me.