E.E. Cummings Poetry

One of my Favourites- maybe because I read in it a warning!;)

yonder deadfromtheneckup graduate...


yonder deadfromtheneckup graduate of a
somewhat obscure to be sure university spends
her time looking picturesque under

the as it happens quite
erroneous impression that he

nascitur

ee cummings

(Back after a long time- Sindhu-:D

Another favourite, due possibly to its uncharactericness:idea:

From "Ballad of the Scholar’s Lament"

When I have struggled through three hundred years
of Roman history, and hastened o’er
Some French play-(though I have my private fears
Of flunking sorely when I take the floor
In class),-when I have steeped my soul in gore
And Greek, and figured over half a ream
With Algebra, which I do (not) adore,
How shall I manage to compose a theme?
It’s well enough to talk of poor and peers,
And munch the golden apples’ shiny core,
And lay a lot of heroes on their biers;-
While the great Alec, knocking down a score,
Takes out his handkerchief, boohoo-ing, “More!”-
But harshly I awaken from my dream,
To find a new,-er,-privilege,-in store:


....

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Originally Posted by quasimodo1

i carry your heart with me(i carry it in my heart) i am never without it (anywhere i go you go, my dear; and whatever is done by only me is your doing, my darling) i fear no fate(for beautiful you are my world, my true) and it's you are whatever a moon has always meant and whatever a sun will always sing is you here is the deepest secret nobody knows there is the root of the root and the bud of the bud and the sky of the sky of a tree called life; which grows higher than soul can hope or mind can hide) and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart i carry your heart (i carry it in my heart)

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Love that one, I haven't read many other poems of his.

If you like one poem by E>E> than you will love all his work. This particular piece I read at my daughter's wedding. With good diction and grace, I hope. quasimodo1

any E.E. Cummings lover remember a piece with the line "...the little lame balloon man, whisteled far and wee..." been trying to find it, don't think it is the first line. quasimodo1

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Originally Posted by quasimodo1

any E.E. Cummings lover remember a piece with the line "...the little lame balloon man, whisteled far and wee..." been trying to find it, don't think it is the first line. quasimodo1

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This is the title:
Chansons Innocentes: I


I hesitate to post the poem because there are too many line shifts. I don't want you to lose any of the poem's meaning by pasting it here, which would just align every line to the left hand side.

Thank you, this has been bugging me for weeks. quasimodo1

I really like this poet :D My fav poem:

From "yes is a pleasant country"

yes is a pleasant country:
if's wintry
(my lovely)
let's open the year

....

love is a deeper season
than reason;
my sweet one
(and april's where we're)

From "suppose
Life is an old man carrying flowers on his head."

young death sits in a cafe
smiling, a piece of money held between
his thumb and first finger

....

there is a lady, whose name is Afterwards
she is sitting beside young death, is slender;
likes flowers.

e e cummings

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Originally Posted by ktd222

This is the title:
Chansons Innocentes: I


I hesitate to post the poem because there are too many line shifts. I don't want you to lose any of the poem's meaning by pasting it here, which would just align every line to the left hand side.

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You can keep the correct formatting by adding code tags, ktd. Just type it in as you would want it, then put [code ] [/ code] around it. (I've added spaces inside the brackets so you can see what I mean, so do the same, but without spaces).

e.g.

Code:

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hello          mr. fish

      said    the

cat                s  a  l    i      v    a  t  i  n  g

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Originally Posted by autumn rose

I really like his poems.His style is so different from most other poets.

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Well, like a lot of modernist poets, he probably owes quite a lot to Gertrude Stein.

Here's some of her work, from the book Tender Buttons:

A Dog
A little monkey goes like a donkey that means to say that means to say that more sighs last goes. Leave with it. A little monkey goes like a donkey.

A White Hunter
A white hunter is nearly crazy.

A Leave
In the middle of a tiny spot and nearly bare there is a nice thing to say that wrist is leading. Wrist is leading.

****

And, from IDENTITY POEM...

PLAY I
I am I because my little dog knows me. The figure wanders on alone.
The little dog does not appear because if it did then there would be nothing to fear.
It is not known that anybody who is anybody is not alone and if alone then how can the dog be there and if the little dog is not there it is alone.

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Originally Posted by blp

You can keep the correct formatting by adding code tags, ktd. Just type it in as you would want it, then put [code ] [/ code] around it. (I've added spaces inside the brackets so you can see what I mean, so do the same, but without spaces).

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Thanks, blp.

e e cummings is a personal favorite. he was a fascinating guy and worked at some really interesting stuff. it's too bad that he's not taught more and better these days. few instructors investigate what he was really all about and unfortunately wind up with very litte understanding of his work. i did a paper on him years ago and he became one of my heros. what do you know about him??

To E.E. fans: When allisonaa asked what do you know about E.E. Cummings I realized I know nothing...just familiarity with his poetry and one first edition. So here is a source which so far is illuninating:
http://project1.caryacademy.org/echo...._cummings.htm lets try that again that's better

WHAT...no one wants to post about E.E.?

I wrote a book of poems for my wife and titled it after the last three lines(after the comma)from this e.e. cummings gem:



if i love you
(thickness means
worlds inhabited by roamingly
stern bright fairies

if you love
me)distance is mind carefully
luminous with innumerable gnomes
Of complete dream

if we love each (shyly)
other,what clouds do or Silently
Flowers resemble beauty
less than our breathing

And for those who are also interested to find out more about his visual art :)

http://eecummingsart.com/

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Originally Posted by quasimodo1

To E.E. fans: When allisonaa asked what do you know about E.E. Cummings I realized I know nothing...just familiarity with his poetry and one first edition. So here is a source which so far is illuninating:
http://project1.caryacademy.org/echo...._cummings.htm lets try that again that's better

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Hi fellow Cummings fans!
I'm in the market for a book with the complete works of ee cummings, does anyone know of a good one i can order off the internet?

B+N was running a hardcover complete works in one volume sale about two weeks ago and i picked up E.E. for about ten bucks. Maybe it's still on. quasimodo1

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Originally Posted by quasimodo1

B+N was running a hardcover complete works in one volume sale about two weeks ago and i picked up E.E. for about ten bucks. Maybe it's still on. quasimodo1

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Hi quasi, I am so excited to find this e e cummings thread. My friend, Downing, told me about it. Wow, I adore cummings poems. I wonder if that is the same book I have. I have had it for years now; mine is a hardback and my mother gave it to me for Christmas one year. I can't begin to tell everyone just how much I have enjoyed that book. I read it so much and recall some parts of some poems by heart, which I never seem to be able to do with other poets. I love the graphic way cummings wrote his poems. Bye the way, quasi, I know the 'balloon man' poem well. It is a great one. One of my favorites is "maggie and milly and molly and may". I like poems with seaside imagery and I love the lines:

may came home with a smooth round stone
as small as a world and as large as alone.

I will look it up on the net and post the whole thing tomorrow. It is from "95 poems" which I also own. I love mostly all the poems in "ViVa". My all time favorite cummings poem is "in time of daffodils (who know".... what a great poem, also from "95 poems".

The man was a genius. I can't wait to rediscover his poems. It will be such a treat. I will definitely be part of these discussions.:)

This and another poem are the only two I read by E.E. Cummings actually...but I just LOVED this one..

From "maggie and milly and molly and may"

maggie and milly and molly and may
went down to the beach (to play one day)

and maggie discovered a shell that sang
so sweetly she couldn’t remember her troubles,and

milly befriended a stranded star
whose rays five languid fingers were;

and molly was chased by a horrible thing
which raced sideways while blowing bubbles:and



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Janine, seems that Nossa posted the poem sooner :). Good, this will let me comment the poem a bit. I read all kinds of interpretation for this poem:

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maggie and milly and molly and may
went down to the beach (to play one day)

and maggie discovered a shell that sang
so sweetly she couldn’t remember her troubles,and

milly befriended a stranded star
whose rays five languid fingers were;

and molly was chased by a horrible thing
which raced sideways while blowing bubbles:and

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I saw somewhere an interpretation that maggie,milly,molly and may are adults and that they are going to the beach and become again children because they play. Sincerely, I do not agree with this viewpoint- I believe that the 4 girls are children and that they simply go to the beach and play. Another user on that site said that we can remark the girls' characters from their activities: he said that maggie was superficial because she forgot so soon her troubles, after listening to a shell's ''melody'' and so on....I do not agree with this interpretation either.
I think that the verses

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may came home with a smooth round stone
as small as a world and as large as alone.

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are full of wisdom and they revolve around the idea of how huge loneliness is-even bigger than the world which we usually perceive enormous.

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For whatever we lose(like a you or a me)
it’s always ourselves we find in the sea.

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The final distich refers to the ''moral''-we find ourselvs in the sea, possibly because when we look in the water, we see our reflection. And another idea I read is that the sea is a metaphor for our soul, so whatever we lose, it's always ourselves we find within us.

I can hardly wait to see your oppinions and come with other interpretations,as well.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by quasimodo1

B+N was running a hardcover complete works in one volume sale about two weeks ago and i picked up E.E. for about ten bucks. Maybe it's still on. quasimodo1

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Thanks! I'll check it out.

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Originally Posted by downing

Janine, seems that Nossa posted the poem sooner :). Good, this will let me comment the poem a bit. I read all kinds of interpretation for this poem:



I saw somewhere an interpretation that maggie,milly,molly and may are adults and that they are going to the beach and become again children because they play. Sincerely, I do not agree with this viewpoint- I believe that the 4 girls are children and that they simply go to the beach and play. Another user on that site said that we can remark the girls' characters from their activities: he said that maggie was superficial because she forgot so soon her troubles, after listening to a shell's ''melody'' and so on....I do not agree with this interpretation either.
I think that the verses
are full of wisdom and they revolve around the idea of how huge loneliness is-even bigger than the world which we usually perceive enormous.



The final distich refers to the ''moral''-we find ourselvs in the sea, possibly because when we look in the water, we see our reflection. And another idea I read is that the sea is a metaphor for our soul, so whatever we lose, it's always ourselves we find within us.

I can hardly wait to see your oppinions and come with other interpretations,as well.

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First, I'm sorry, I didn't know that someone was gonna post this poem before me :blush:
Now the only way I can interpret this poem, is summed up in the last couplet. The fact that each girl had a different thing when they went to the seaside, is exactly what the poem is trying to tell us. It doesn't matter what the girls are like, the point here is that each of them got what fitted here. In other words, each of the girls found what interests her, and that is further elaborated when the poet himself said by the end of the poem that whatever we lose, we can easily find, just by going to the seaside.
Now the part about whether the girls are children or adults, this can be debatable. I can relate to both opinions though. Maybe the girls ARE adults who go to the seaside to seek what they lost before, thier innocence, these childish dreams which the poet depicted. Such as making friends with a star or finding a singing shell. On the other hand, they might be just little childten who went to play near the sea, and through this scene the poet is also trying to convey the idea he said in the last two lines. He was trying to make us identify with these girls, and remember the child missing within each of us.

Nossa, This is one of my all time favorite e e cummings poems. I have read it hundreds of times. Downing was referring to the fast that I just emailed her the poem the other night and then I discovered this thread when she told me about it. No problem, that you posted it. I have others I would like to post, as well. I was thrilled to see someone else who loved the poem, as well as I do.

Downing, thanks for providing us with this insight into the reviewers comments on the meaning of the poem. It certainly gives us something added to consider. I, myself, look at the poem 'simply', since I love going to the seaside; I love hunting for shells and creatures on the beach.
My favorite lines are the two stanzas that Downing has pointed out, especially the one about the stone. I, for one, always find 'my true self' when I go to the ocean's edge, so the last line means renewal or rebirth to me, personally.

Here is my all time favorite e e cummings poem

From "in time of daffodils"

in time of daffodils(who know
the goal of living is to grow)
forgetting why,remember how

in time of lilacs who proclaim
the aim of waking is to dream,
remember so(forgetting seem)

in time of roses(who amaze
our now and here with paradise)
forgetting if,remember yes



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To Janine: I didn't know you were so fond of E.E.Cummings. The man and his poetry were ahead of their time and whatever items in his biography that some might use to diminish his genious are a factor of his lifestyle and of only the most peripheral interest. Did you explore the great website I posted on this thread? quasi

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Originally Posted by quasimodo1

To Janine: I didn't know you were so fond of E.E.Cummings. The man and his poetry were ahead of their time and whatever items in his biography that some might use to diminish his genious are a factor of his lifestyle and of only the most peripheral interest. Did you explore the great website I posted on this thread? quasi

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quasi, I did not get a chance to check out the site yet. I want to; thanks for posting it. I have been a big fan of cummings for years. I had a nearly complete book of his poems and several other smaller ones such as 99 poems. How could I ignore such a creative and graphicly expressive artist/poet as cummings. He was far ahead of his time and certainly was a great genius. I will be very interested in that site indeed. I have several works I picked up recently from the library free shelf - one is his prose piece "The Enormous Room", which I someday intend to read. I am tired so I hope I got that title correct. Now actually my brain is asleep so that is where I am headed, too. Goodnight!

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Originally Posted by Janine

Here is my all time favorite e e cummings poem

in time of daffodils

in time of daffodils(who know
the goal of living is to grow)
forgetting why,remember how

in time of lilacs who proclaim
the aim of waking is to dream,
remember so(forgetting seem)

in time of roses(who amaze
our now and here with paradise)
forgetting if,remember yes

....

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WOW!! Simply great! Thank you SO much for posting is Janine. You're gonna make me start reading more of E.E. Cummings poems now :D

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Originally Posted by Nossa

WOW!! Simply great! Thank you SO much for posting is Janine. You're gonna make me start reading more of E.E. Cummings poems now :D

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Hi Nossa, so glad you liked it. That is my all time favorite of his. This is my second favorite:

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somewhere i have never travelled,gladly beyond
by E. E. Cummings


somewhere i have never travelled,gladly beyond
any experience,your eyes have their silence:
in your most frail gesture are things which enclose me,
or which i cannot touch because they are too near

your slightest look will easily unclose me
though i have closed myself as fingers,
you open always petal by petal myself as Spring opens
(touching skilfully,mysteriously)her first rose

or if your wish be to close me, i and
my life will shut very beautifully ,suddenly,
as when the heart of this flower imagines
the snow carefully everywhere descending;
nothing which we are to perceive in this world equals
the power of your intense fragility:whose texture
compels me with the color of its countries,
rendering death and forever with each breathing

(i do not know what it is about you that closes
and opens;only something in me understands
the voice of your eyes is deeper than all roses)
nobody,not even the rain,has such small hands

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The last line was used in the Woody Allen film "Hannah and Her Sisters". I nearly fell on the floor in the theater, when the line came up on the screen. I knew the poem so well by then. It seemed the line was speaking directly to me at the time. Interesting poem, is it not?

Yes, I surely hope you do read more cummings - it is totally worth your while!

Can someone please explain why these two poems are so profound? I've spent the last three days reddening my eyes sore with pondering:

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Xaipe 12

two

o o
ld
o

nce upo

n
a(
n

o mo

re
)time
me

n

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and

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1(a

le
af
fa
ll

s)
one
l

iness

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Quote:

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Originally Posted by Janine

Hi Nossa, so glad you liked it. That is my all time favorite of his. This is my second favorite:



The last line was used in the Woody Allen film "Hannah and Her Sisters". I nearly fell on the floor in the theater, when the line came up on the screen. I knew the poem so well by then. It seemed the line was speaking directly to me at the time. Interesting poem, is it not?

Yes, I surely hope you do read more cummings - it is totally worth your while!

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I sure will read more of his works. I just can't seem to find any of his works here...I searched yesterday in every place I know :(
And I LOVE that poem you posted...Gosh, it got me imaging EVERY little detail he mentioned...just GREAT!!

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Originally Posted by Adolescent09

Can someone please explain why these two poems are so profound? I've spent the last three days reddening my eyes sore with pondering:

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Adol

I don't find them profound. Just because one arranges letters on a page in a fancy/different way does not make it profound. I know everyone else will throw tomatoes at me for saying this, but I don't find e.e. cummings profound. I'm not saying he's a bad poet; he makes me smile on occaision But I don't feel he's either revolutionary or deep or even in the top tier of poets of his day.

OK, everyone fling your tomatoes. :D

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Originally Posted by Virgil

Adol

I don't find them profound. Just because one arranges letters on a page in a fancy/different way does not make it profound. I know everyone else will throw tomatoes at me for saying this, but I don't find e.e. cummings profound. I'm not saying he's a bad poet; he makes me smile on occaision But I don't feel he's either revolutionary or deep or even in the top tier of poets of his day.

OK, everyone fling your tomatoes. :D

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You asked for it - SPLAT!

http://i125.photobucket.com/albums/p...ertomatoes.jpg:lol: :D :lol: :D :lol: :D :lol: :D :lol:

To Janine: Nobody is going to throw anything but many of his works are profound and many are joyful. Top tier? How about near there. quasi

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Originally Posted by quasimodo1

To Janine: Nobody is going to throw anything but many of his works are profound and many are joyful. Top tier? How about near there. quasi

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quasi, I fully agree! Throwing tomatoes only at Virgil....his idea! I was happy to ablige. :)

All the kudos and flying tomatoes aside, can someone, that being the major advocates and fans of Cummings' poetry, explain the meaning of those two works I previously quoted?

http://www.coverbands.com.au/Bands/S...splat_logo.jpg

http://gallery.photo.net/photo/688408-md.jpg


Oh my, right across my chest. :p :p I'd prefer that on my speghetti. ;)

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Originally Posted by Adolescent09

All the kudos and flying tomatoes aside, can someone, that being the major advocates and fans of Cummings' poetry, explain the meaning of those two works I previously quoted?

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Please, I'd really like to know. I'm not trying to be rude or anything (I see you guys like jokes), but it has really been eating away at me.

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1(a

le
af
fa
ll

s)
one
l

iness

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Adolescent09,

I don’t want to tell you word by word its possible meaning because it would take all the surprise from you when you realize what the poem is achieving. But I can tell you how I would begin analyzing this poem; take each word that would be formed as a separate thought; then begin deconstructing those thoughts.
Hope I was helpful;)

By the way, I do like some of Cumming’s work, but some of it just gives me a headache when reading them.