Sunday, July 17, 2011

The Man with the Blue Guitar (XVII)


XVII

The person has a mould. But not
Its animal. The angelic ones

Speak of the soul, the mind. It is
An animal. The blue guitar —

On that its claws propound, its fangs
Articulate its desert days.

The blue guitar a mould? That shell?
Well, after all, the north wind blows

A horn, on which its victory
Is a worm composing on a straw.

---
Wallace Stevens
from The Man with the Blue Guitar, 1937

[Poem is in the public domain in Canada]


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