The sun., 1917-05-27
The Imssist Poets Annual.

hCnAIo AlolHetOu, II. ~, JOhh
Gould Fletcher. F. s. Flint, d. II. Law
renee and Amy Lowell travel together
in Some Ima0ist Poets. 1917: An An
nMal Anthology (Houghton Miffiin).
Poets, even more perhaps than other
writers. are revealed In their topics.
The Imagists select subjects like
these: "vicarious Atonement," Field
Mannuvres." Dawn" 'Tnarticulate
Grief" "Adonis." "Pygmaiion." Lin
coln." Blackberry Harvest" Moon
light" "Armies," ''Zeppelins." Dusk"
Terra Nuova.'' Lacquer Prints"-a
list which is. as you choose to look
at It. either higgledy-piggledy as
sortment or a token Of wide ranging
comprehensive vision.
The first thing we notice is that
these poets carefully avoid the lately
much berated vocabulary OF the older
fashion. We do not find that they
too obviously circumlocute: they do
not use the coarse. violent diction In
which their conspicuous emulators
cloak weakness OF thought. But Is
there no happy medium between the
old sentimentalism, even melodrama,
and the new severity? Exuberant ex-
preston and self-conscious repression
are both bad, perhaps; but the former
is at least more cheerful than the lat
ter. Is Mr.. Arlington truly writing
poetry here:
This Is an old and very cruel god
We will endure:
We will try not to vince
when he crushes and rends us.
But. o thou old and very cruel god.
Take. II thou canst. this bitter cup from
U.S.
II. D." Is mystic :.
pluck the cyciAmen
red by wine-red
and place the petals
stir ivory and bright fire
against my flesh.
Now I am powerless
to draw back
for the sea is cyclamen- purple.
cyclamen-red. color OF tho last grapes.
color of the purple of tho flowers.
cyclamen -colored and dark.
Iongfellow, who cannot be much
admired by these poets, said, Look
into thine own heart, and write"
Nowadays the poets seem to look into
their own livers. Mr.. Fletcher's Lin
coin" has the measured march of the
ode which rhymes do not adorn:
strew over him flowers;
Blue forgetmenots from tho north. and the
bright pink arbutus
From the east, and from the west the rich
orange blossom,
But from tho heart of the land take the
passion flower:
Rayed. violet. dim.
with the warts that pierced, the cross
that he bore and the circlet.
And beside 1t. there, lay also ono lonely
snow white magnolia.
Bitter for remembrance OF tho healing
which has passed.
Poet F1int's Zeppelin nightmare ends;
What Is that behind the trees?-
name coiored circle OF light that glows
and grows brighter aud DINNER by turns.
Is 1t an airship on hre?
1t burns on. and moves nearer. slowly;
II swings clear OF the trees
the moonl
Mr.. Lawrence makes himself suf-
fer ingeniously
- TIL at last
IL is dark, hs uark as hight' OF ueath, OF
hell
and ] am dead. and trodden like earth
in the sodden earth.
dead. and trodden to nought in the sour
black earth.
dead and trodden to nousht. trodden to
nought
That's nothing: for
All. but 1t is good to have been troddcn
Trodden to nought In black cold earth.
quite to nought,
to nothing;
absolutely TO nothing.
Absolutely and positively. nothing.
The imagist poem is a series of pic
lures. Of impressions. and so true to
its name. But there was good deal
Of sense. of Psychological feeling" for
human nature in the older poets. who
did not hesitate 20 tell US. more or less
Is.l- -. VkA& 81.