|
 |
Selected Poems
Book
Description
This review is from a strictly prose guy, as poetry
usually goes right over my head. In my efforts to
understand poetry, I have discovered that the work
of e.e. cummings breaks through the stylistic
barriers that make many people shy away from poetry
altogether. cummings' use of bizarre spacing,
punctuation, and phrasings keeps the reader away
from the "sing-song" routine that tends to damage
the credibility of many a poem, and cummings uses
the art of style to say many things and make many
points in just a few words. The most fascinating
aspect of cummings' work is letting the small number
of words in a poem really sink in until you gain
many insights. This book usefully arranges cummings'
most noteworthy poems into categories so you can
more easily dwell on his major areas of subject
matter. cummings did not live the hard life of many
noteworthy poets, so a good number of his poems are
musings on abstract concepts like life, love,
mythology, and mortality. However, his much sharper
observations on war, prostitution, politics, and the
dark side of urban life can be truly shocking once
you delve into their deeper meanings. Contemplating
the title of this review, which is also the first
line of the poem on page 181 of this book, will help
any poetry-fearing reader to dive into cummings'
world.
|
Famous
Poems
