Modern Poetry, Ezra Pound

Read introduction to Modern Poetry in textbook (645).

Ezra Pound

"The River-Merchant's Wife: a Letter" & "The Garden"

• Read "The River-Merchant's Wife: a Letter". Summarize the events of each of the first four stanzas.
• In line 25, the speaker says "They hurt me." Who is the "they" and why would they cause the speaker pain?
• Read "The Garden". What does the simile in line 1, comparing the woman to a loose skein of silk, say about her? What conclusions can a reader draw?
• How does the image in the second stanza directly contrast the image in the first?
• There are two definite characters in the poem, the woman and the speaker. Pound, however, is making a broader statement on the world here. What is that broader statement he is making in this poem?
• Read "A Few Don'ts for Imagistes" by Ezra Pound." Practice following the rules for poetry he sets out by writing your own imagist poem. Choose a topic about which you feel strongly (you could use one of the topics in Pound's poems: need for human contact, lost love, social classes, etc., or choose your own). Next, choose a concrete image that could convey an idea about this idea. Write a poem connecting this idea with the concrete image; it could be as short as "In the Station of the Metro" or longer like "The Garden" or "The River-Merchant's Wife: a Letter".

Read the poem "Images" by Richard Aldington.

• Identify the main image in each stanza.
• What theme is developed through each separate image?