April 4, 2005: i thank You God for most this amazing, e.e. cummings
i thank You God for most this amazing
e.e. cummings
i thank You God for most this amazing
day:for the leaping greenly spirits of trees
and a blue true dream of sky;and for everything
which is natural which is infinite which is yes
(i who have died am alive again today,
and this is the sun’s birthday;this is the birth
day of life and of love and wings:and of the gay
great happening illimitably earth)
how should tasting touching hearing seeing
breathing any—lifted from the no
of allnothing—human merely being
doubt unimaginable You?
(now the ears of my ears awake and
now the eyes of my eyes are opened)
[Marie Howe (who we’ll definitely be getting to later) said, “Most
poetry is some kind of prayer, even if it’s just crying out to the
silences.” This is maybe my favorite collusion of prayer and poetry,
outside of John Donne.
Everyone’s read cummings, and everyone’s probably read the same four
cummings poems, but I love this one so much; there should be more
poetry about pure unbridled joy. Like the rest of his poetry, this
plays with syntax to make certain words and ideas stand out — which
means it might require a couple of reads to get fully — and it’s
lyrical enough to get stuck in my head on gorgeous mornings, all while
being less twee than it seems like it should be. It makes me happy.
And I love how the last couplet seems to play with Paul’s idea of
heaven, the seeing dimly in a mirror vs. face-to-face.]
MORE LIKE THIS:
— since feeling is first, e.e. cummings
— pity this busy monster, manunkind, by e.e. cummings
— God’s World, by Edna St. Vincent Millay
