Stanley Kunitz was a reviser of his poetry, ascribing to the Valéry view:
"A poem is never finished, it's only abandoned".
A thing that caught my attention years and years ago was the fact that he may have revised 100 times and at the time I thought how to find the time - perhaps this is the weakness in the modern, promulgated by the $100+k MFA Yanks (all in a hurry to vomit what they've written, measuring it on a return on the dollar.
Take a poem month see yous in 2027 motherfuckers
I offer a free year of second level here e.g.
PaddyMorphy.poet.ie for any who want to sign up to 'Whats Another' before end the end of january 2026
Back to Stanley - he emphasized spareness, musicality, emotional truth, and organic dev.
Feck sake he revised all the time up into his 90's - like my fecking hard drive - finding where we ended up - like that one boat from Africa - quo vadis - but I always loved...
End of Summer
By Stanley Kunitz
An agitation of the air,
A perturbation of the light
Admonished me the unloved year
Would turn on its hinge that night.
I stood in the disenchanted field
Amid the stubble and the stones
Amaded, while a small worm lisped to me
The song of my marrow-bones.
Blue poured into summer blue,
A hawk broke from his cloudless tower,
The roof of the silo blazed, and I knew
That part of my life was forever over.
Already the iron door of the North
Clangs open: birds,leaves,snows
Order their populations forth,
And a cruel wind blows.
--
The great Kunitz - Gesamtkunstwerk
