The Man with the Blue Guitar (XXVII)

XXVII

It is the sea that whitens the roof.
The sea drifts through the winter air.

It is the sea that the north wind makes.
The sea is in the falling snow.

This gloom is the darkness of the sea.
Geographers and philosophers,

Regard. But for that salty cup,
But for the icicles on the eaves --

The sea is a form of ridicule.
The iceberg settings satirize

The demon that cannot be himself,
That tours to shift the shifting scene.

---

Wallace Stevens
from The Man with the Blue Guitar, 1937

[Poem is in the public domain in Canada]

Read the complete poem here.

Wallace Stevens biography