William Carlos Williams

Marriage
by William Carlos Williams

So different, this man
And this woman:
A stream flowing
In a field.



“It is in tune with the tempo of life — scattered yet welded into the whole, — broken, yet woven together.”
―William Carlos Williams



“Poetry demands a different material than prose. It uses another facet of the same fact … the spontaneous conformation of language as it is heard.”
―William Carlos Williams


“Poets are being pursued by the philosophers today, out of the poverty of philosophy. God damn it, you might think a man had no business to be writing, to be a poet unless some philosophic stinker gave him permission.”
―William Carlos Williams



“My first poem was a bolt from the blue … it broke a spell of disillusion and suicidal despondence. … it filled me with soul satisfying joy”
―William Carlos Williams






 
“Poets are being pursued by the philosophers today, out of the poverty of

philosophy. God damn it, you might think a man had no business to be writing,

to be a poet unless some philosophic stinker gave him permission.”
[Letter to James Laughlin (14 January 1944), published in The Selected Letters

of William Carlos Williams (1957) edited by John C. Thirlwall, p. 219 -

General sources]
―William Carlos Williams








“One thing I am convinced more and more is true and that is this: the only way to be truly happy is to make others happy. When you realize that and take advantage of the fact, everything is made perfect.”
―William Carlos Williams


  
“It is in tune with the tempo of life — scattered yet welded into the whole, — broken, yet woven together.”
[On his work, in an interview in The New York Herald Tribune (18 January 1932) - General sources]
―William Carlos Williams




“Poetry demands a different material than prose. It uses another facet of the same fact … the spontaneous conformation of language as it is heard.”
[Detail & Prosody for the Poem Patterson given to James Laughlin (1939), now at Houghton Library - General sources]
―William Carlos Williams




“Poets are being pursued by the philosophers today, out of the poverty of philosophy. God damn it, you might think a man had no business to be writing, to be a poet unless some philosophic stinker gave him permission.”
[Letter to James Laughlin (14 January 1944), published in The Selected Letters of William Carlos Williams (1957) edited by John C. Thirlwall, p. 219 - General sources]
―William Carlos Williams




“My first poem was a bolt from the blue … it broke a spell of disillusion and suicidal despondence. … it filled me with soul satisfying joy”
[The Autobiography of William Carlos Williams (1951) [W. W. Norton & Co., 1967, ISBN 978-0811202268] - General sources]
―William Carlos Williams

 
“There's a lot of bastards out there!”
[General sources]
―William Carlos Williams




“I liked this because of the elimination of the essential in the composition.
I cut it down and down, and down. This squeezed up to make it vivid.”
[Annotation on Chicory and Daisies (1915) on John C. Thirlwell's copy of The Collected Earlier Poems (c. 1958) - General sources]
―William Carlos Williams



  
“I thought my friends were damn fools, because they didn't know any better way of conducting their lives. Still they conformed better than I to a code. I wanted to conform but I couldn't so I wrote my poetry.”
[Annotations on John C. Thirlwell's copy of The Collected Earlier Poems (c. 1958) - General sources]
―William Carlos Williams





“Being an art form, verse cannot be free in the sense of having no limitations or guiding principle.”
[As quoted in Free Verse.Princeton Encyclopedia of Poetry and Poetics 2nd ed (1975) - General sources]
―William Carlos Williams



 
“So different, this man And this woman: A stream flowing In a field.”
[Poetry Chicago, 1916) - Marriage (1916)]
―William Carlos Williams





“Lift your flowers on bitter stems chickory! Lift them up out of the scorched ground! Bear no foliage but give yourself wholly to that! Strain under them you bitter stems that no beast eats — and scorn greyness!”
[Chicory and Daisies - Al Que Quiere! (1917)]
―William Carlos Williams




“The earth cracks and is shriveled up; the wind moans piteously; the sky goes
out if you should fail.”
[Chicory and Daisies - Al Que Quiere! (1917)]
―William Carlos Williams



“Why do I write today? The beauty of the terrible faces of our nonentities stirs me to it: colored women day workers— old and experienced— returning home at dusk, in cast off clothing faces like old Florentine oak.”
[Al Que Quiere! (1917)]
―William Carlos Williams



“The set pieces of your faces stir me — leading citizens — but not in the same way.”
[Al Que Quiere! (1917)]
―William Carlos Williams




“I lie here thinking of you:— the stain of love is upon the world!”
[Love Song - Al Que Quiere! (1917)]
―William Carlos Williams




“It's a strange courage you give me ancient star: Shine alone in the sunrise toward which you lend no part!”
[El Hombre - Al Que Quiere! (1917)]
―William Carlos Williams



“Who shall say I am not the happy genius of my household?”
[Danse Russe - Al Que Quiere! (1917)]
―William Carlos Williams



“So much depends upon a red wheel barrow glazed with rain water beside the white chickens”
[The Red Wheelbarrow - Spring and All (1923)]
―William Carlos Williams


“By the road to the contagious hospital under the surge of the blue mottled
clouds driven from the northeast — a cold wind.”
[Spring and All - Spring and All (1923)]
―William Carlos Williams



“The pure products of America go crazy —”
[To Elsie - Spring and All (1923)]
―William Carlos Williams



“Among the rain and lights I saw the figure 5 in gold on a red firetruck moving tense unheeded to gong clangs siren howls and wheels rumbling through the dark city.”
[The Great Figure - Sour Grapes (1921)]
―William Carlos Williams


“I have eaten the plums that were in the icebox and which you were probably
saving for breakfast Forgive me they were delicious so sweet and so cold”
[This Is Just to Say - Collected Poems 1921-1931 (1934)]
―William Carlos Williams


“He's come out of the man and he's let the man go —”
[Collected Poems 1921-1931 (1934)]
―William Carlos Williams


“Among of green stiff old bright broken branch come white sweet May again”
[The Locust Tree in Flower - An Early Martyr and Other Poems (1935)]
―William Carlos Williams











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