To be painstakingly precise, each
contributor
has
been his own editor.
been his own editor.
American Poetry - 1922
The dissimilarities of temperament, range
and choice of subjects are manifest, but the outstanding difference is
this: _Georgian Poetry_ has an editor, and the poems it contains may be
taken as that editor's reaction to the poetry of the day. The
_Miscellany_, on the other hand, has no editor; it is no one person's
choice which forms it; it is not an attempt to throw into relief any
particular group or stress any particular tendency. It does disclose the
most recent work of certain representative figures in contemporary
American literature. The poets who appear here have come together by
mutual accord and, although they may invite others to join them in
subsequent volumes as circumstance dictates, each one stands (as all
newcomers also must stand) as the exponent of fresh and strikingly
diverse qualities in our native poetry. It is as if a dozen unacademic
painters, separated by temperament and distance, were to arrange to have
an exhibition every two years of their latest work. They would not
pretend that they were the only painters worthy of a public showing;
they would maintain that their work was, generally speaking, most
interesting to one another. Their gallery would necessarily be limited;
but it would be flexible enough to admit, with every fresh exhibit,
three or four new members who had achieved an importance and an idiom
of their own. This is just what the original contributors to the
_Miscellany_ have done.
The newcomers--H. D. , Alfred Kreymborg, and Edna St. Vincent
Millay--have taken their places with the same absence of judge or jury
that marks any "society of independents. " There is no hanging committee;
no organizer of "position. " Two years ago the alphabet determined the
arrangement; this time seniority has been the sole arbiter of
precedence. Furthermore--and this can not be too often repeated--there
has been no editor.
To be painstakingly precise, each contributor has
been his own editor. As such, he has chosen his own selections and
determined the order in which they are to be printed, but he has had no
authority over either the choice or grouping of his fellow exhibitors'
contributions. To one of the members has been delegated the merely
mechanical labors of assembling, proof-reading, and seeing the volume
through the press. The absence of E. A. Robinson from this year's
_Miscellany_ is a source of regret not only to all the contributors but
to the poet himself. Mr. Robinson has written nothing since his
Collected Poems with the exception of a long poem--a volume in
itself--but he hopes to appear in any subsequent collection.
It should be added that this is not a haphazard anthology of picked-over
poetry. The poems that follow are new. They are new not only in the
sense that (with two exceptions) they cannot be found in book form, but
most of them have never previously been published. Certain of the
selections have appeared in recent magazines and these are reprinted by
permission of _The Century_, _The Yale Review_, _Poetry: A Magazine of
Verse_, _The New Republic_, _Harper's_, _Scribner's_, _The Bookman_,
_The Freeman_, _Broom_, _The Dial_, _The Atlantic Monthly_, _Farm and
Fireside_, _The Measure_, and _The Literary Review_. Vachel Lindsay's "I
Know All This When Gipsy Fiddles Cry" is a revised version of the poem
of that name which was printed in _The Enchanted Years_.
CONTENTS
_A Foreword_ _III_
AMY LOWELL
Lilacs _3_
Twenty-four Hokku on a Modern Theme _8_
The Swans _13_
Prime _16_
Vespers _17_
In Excelsis _18_
La Ronde du Diable _20_
ROBERT FROST
Fire and Ice _25_
The Grindstone _26_
The Witch of Coos _29_
A Brook in the City _37_
Design _38_
CARL SANDBURG
And So To-day _41_
California City Landscape _49_
Upstream _51_
Windflower Leaf _52_
VACHEL LINDSAY
In Praise of Johnny Appleseed _55_
I Know All This When Gipsy Fiddles Cry _66_
JAMES OPPENHEIM
Hebrews _75_
ALFRED KREYMBORG
Adagio: A Duet _79_
Die Kuche _80_
Rain _81_
Peasant _83_
Bubbles _85_
Dirge _87_
Colophon _88_
SARA TEASDALE
Wisdom _91_
Places _92_
_Twilight_ (Tucson)
_Full Moon_ (Santa Barbara)
_Winter Sun_ (Lenox)
_Evening_ (Nahant)
Words for an Old Air _97_
Those Who Love _98_
Two Songs for Solitude _99_
_The Crystal Gazer_
_The Solitary_
LOUIS UNTERMEYER
Monolog from a Mattress _103_
Waters of Babylon _110_
The Flaming Circle _112_
Portrait of a Machine _114_
Roast Leviathan _115_
JOHN GOULD FLETCHER
A Rebel _127_
The Rock _128_
Blue Water _129_
Prayers for Wind _130_
Impromptu _131_
Chinese Poet Among Barbarians _132_
Snowy Mountains _133_
The Future _134_
Upon the Hill _136_
The Enduring _137_
JEAN STARR UNTERMEYER
Old Man _141_
Tone Picture _142_
They Say-- _143_
Rescue _144_
Mater in Extremis _146_
Self-Rejected _147_
H. D.
Holy Satyr _151_
Lais _153_
Heliodora _156_
Toward the Piraeus _161_
_Slay with your eyes, Greek_
_You would have broken my wings_
_I loved you_
_What had you done_
_If I had been a boy_
_It was not chastity that made me cold_
CONRAD AIKEN
Seven Twilights _171_
_The ragged pilgrim on the road to nowhere_
_Now by the wall of the ancient town_
_When the tree bares, the music of it changes_
_"This is the hour," she says, "of transmutation"_
_Now the great wheel of darkness and low clouds_
_Heaven, you say, will be a field in April_
_In the long silence of the sea_
Tetelestai _184_
EDNA ST.
and choice of subjects are manifest, but the outstanding difference is
this: _Georgian Poetry_ has an editor, and the poems it contains may be
taken as that editor's reaction to the poetry of the day. The
_Miscellany_, on the other hand, has no editor; it is no one person's
choice which forms it; it is not an attempt to throw into relief any
particular group or stress any particular tendency. It does disclose the
most recent work of certain representative figures in contemporary
American literature. The poets who appear here have come together by
mutual accord and, although they may invite others to join them in
subsequent volumes as circumstance dictates, each one stands (as all
newcomers also must stand) as the exponent of fresh and strikingly
diverse qualities in our native poetry. It is as if a dozen unacademic
painters, separated by temperament and distance, were to arrange to have
an exhibition every two years of their latest work. They would not
pretend that they were the only painters worthy of a public showing;
they would maintain that their work was, generally speaking, most
interesting to one another. Their gallery would necessarily be limited;
but it would be flexible enough to admit, with every fresh exhibit,
three or four new members who had achieved an importance and an idiom
of their own. This is just what the original contributors to the
_Miscellany_ have done.
The newcomers--H. D. , Alfred Kreymborg, and Edna St. Vincent
Millay--have taken their places with the same absence of judge or jury
that marks any "society of independents. " There is no hanging committee;
no organizer of "position. " Two years ago the alphabet determined the
arrangement; this time seniority has been the sole arbiter of
precedence. Furthermore--and this can not be too often repeated--there
has been no editor.
To be painstakingly precise, each contributor has
been his own editor. As such, he has chosen his own selections and
determined the order in which they are to be printed, but he has had no
authority over either the choice or grouping of his fellow exhibitors'
contributions. To one of the members has been delegated the merely
mechanical labors of assembling, proof-reading, and seeing the volume
through the press. The absence of E. A. Robinson from this year's
_Miscellany_ is a source of regret not only to all the contributors but
to the poet himself. Mr. Robinson has written nothing since his
Collected Poems with the exception of a long poem--a volume in
itself--but he hopes to appear in any subsequent collection.
It should be added that this is not a haphazard anthology of picked-over
poetry. The poems that follow are new. They are new not only in the
sense that (with two exceptions) they cannot be found in book form, but
most of them have never previously been published. Certain of the
selections have appeared in recent magazines and these are reprinted by
permission of _The Century_, _The Yale Review_, _Poetry: A Magazine of
Verse_, _The New Republic_, _Harper's_, _Scribner's_, _The Bookman_,
_The Freeman_, _Broom_, _The Dial_, _The Atlantic Monthly_, _Farm and
Fireside_, _The Measure_, and _The Literary Review_. Vachel Lindsay's "I
Know All This When Gipsy Fiddles Cry" is a revised version of the poem
of that name which was printed in _The Enchanted Years_.
CONTENTS
_A Foreword_ _III_
AMY LOWELL
Lilacs _3_
Twenty-four Hokku on a Modern Theme _8_
The Swans _13_
Prime _16_
Vespers _17_
In Excelsis _18_
La Ronde du Diable _20_
ROBERT FROST
Fire and Ice _25_
The Grindstone _26_
The Witch of Coos _29_
A Brook in the City _37_
Design _38_
CARL SANDBURG
And So To-day _41_
California City Landscape _49_
Upstream _51_
Windflower Leaf _52_
VACHEL LINDSAY
In Praise of Johnny Appleseed _55_
I Know All This When Gipsy Fiddles Cry _66_
JAMES OPPENHEIM
Hebrews _75_
ALFRED KREYMBORG
Adagio: A Duet _79_
Die Kuche _80_
Rain _81_
Peasant _83_
Bubbles _85_
Dirge _87_
Colophon _88_
SARA TEASDALE
Wisdom _91_
Places _92_
_Twilight_ (Tucson)
_Full Moon_ (Santa Barbara)
_Winter Sun_ (Lenox)
_Evening_ (Nahant)
Words for an Old Air _97_
Those Who Love _98_
Two Songs for Solitude _99_
_The Crystal Gazer_
_The Solitary_
LOUIS UNTERMEYER
Monolog from a Mattress _103_
Waters of Babylon _110_
The Flaming Circle _112_
Portrait of a Machine _114_
Roast Leviathan _115_
JOHN GOULD FLETCHER
A Rebel _127_
The Rock _128_
Blue Water _129_
Prayers for Wind _130_
Impromptu _131_
Chinese Poet Among Barbarians _132_
Snowy Mountains _133_
The Future _134_
Upon the Hill _136_
The Enduring _137_
JEAN STARR UNTERMEYER
Old Man _141_
Tone Picture _142_
They Say-- _143_
Rescue _144_
Mater in Extremis _146_
Self-Rejected _147_
H. D.
Holy Satyr _151_
Lais _153_
Heliodora _156_
Toward the Piraeus _161_
_Slay with your eyes, Greek_
_You would have broken my wings_
_I loved you_
_What had you done_
_If I had been a boy_
_It was not chastity that made me cold_
CONRAD AIKEN
Seven Twilights _171_
_The ragged pilgrim on the road to nowhere_
_Now by the wall of the ancient town_
_When the tree bares, the music of it changes_
_"This is the hour," she says, "of transmutation"_
_Now the great wheel of darkness and low clouds_
_Heaven, you say, will be a field in April_
_In the long silence of the sea_
Tetelestai _184_
EDNA ST.
