Wallace Stevens Bio

Wallace Stevens 1879 –1955

Married to a figure etched, immortalized

In currency. Father to a little girl dreaming of

Ice cream emperors. Or maybe not.

Not only a man, but merely a poet.

He sees, understands, and encompasses

All things, every contradiction within

Himself, within the world. It is he. 

The order, the chaos of creation, which

Is to say the transmutation of forms

The constant metamorphosis to find

What will suffice. To find the thing that speaks

And gives satisfaction, a sound that lingers

Stroking and soothing the wearied ear, normally

Sick, and filled with monotony, tracing a line from

The canal to the mind, the mind to the eyes

Of the soul who wants to see the world, perceive

It, engage with it, restructure and rebuild it,

Stripping away the current buildings and bridges,

The layers of standing lies.  Move the world to

Where it was, to what it was and know it. Feel it.

Sense the emotion, the rocking violence, the hissing

Peacock within, who stands tall and resists the

Overwhelming intelligence, puffing out his

Chest, fluffing his brilliant plumage- the greens

The blues, as well as the shimmering, elusive

Purples, reds and browns. He shakes the feathers

 and reveals reality, the nonsense, the fictions:

the way we live and what we do.

btw- he was an insurance lawyer.