if i have made,my lady,intricate
imperfect various things chiefly which wrong
your eyes(frailer than most deep dreams are frail)
songs less firm than your body’s whitest song
upon my mind — if i have failed to snare
the glance too shy — if through my singing slips
the very skilful strangeness of your smile
the keen primeval silence of your hair
— let the world say, “his most wise music stole
nothing from death” —
you only will create
(who are so perfectly alive)my shame:
lady through whose profound and fragile lips
the small clumsy feet of April came
into the ragged meadow of my soul
*
Hello Friends —
Of all the famous occurrences of “April” in poetry (see also Chaucer, Eliot), this untitled E.E. Cummings poem is my favorite. Oh, and the jabberwockean words in subject line of this email come from another of cumming’s great seasonal works, “in Just- / spring.”
April is National Poetry Month, and I am celebrating by emailing out my own eclectic selection of one poem per day for the duration of the month. If you wish to be unsubscribed from this Poem-a-Day email list at any time, please reply to this email with a friendly unsubscribe request (preferably in heroic couplet form). You may also request to add a consenting friend to the list, or even nominate a poem.
To learn more about National Poetry Month, or to subscribe to a more official-like Poem-a-Day list, visit www.poets.org.
Enjoy.
Ellen
“if i have made,my lady,intricate” by E.E. Cummings was featured again for Poem-a-Day April 13, 2009 and Poem-a-Day April 13, 2011.
Poems by E.E. Cummings were also featured for Poem-a-Day April 13, 2008 and Poem-a-Day April 20, 2010.