After Forethought

I have characterized the poetry of James Schuyler as being in tune with the moment that comes almost like an afterthought but on retrospect appears as premeditated. Consider the end of a poem to artist Anne Dunn on her name day. The speaker debates the composition of floral tribute with botanical finesse but ends the poem with the following

Gathered with friends
And family to celebrate
Your name day, Anne. (Along
With the flowers, I send
You a New Brunswick lobster.)

Cooked we hope to a beautiful pink.

And there would be in the corpus a poem called "Afterward" which ends with "This room needs flowers."

The cover illustration to the 1980 The Morning of the Poem is by Anne Dunn.

At first glance it looks like the plant is growing out of the pavement. Upon further observation it is evident that what is on display is an amaryllis growing out of a square pot in front of a window in some cityscape. Double take.

And so for day 1507
28.01.2011