The Dao of Wallace Stevens

homunculus et la belle etoile, by wallace stevens

In the sea, Biscayne, there prinks

The young emerald, evening star,

Good light for drunkards, poets, widows,

And ladies soon to be married.

By this light the salty fishes

Arch in the sea like tree-branches,

Going in many directions

Up and down.

This light conducts

The thoughts of drunkards, the feelings

Of widows and trembling ladies,

The movements of fishes.

How pleasant an existence it is

That this emerald charms philosophers,

Until they become thoughtlessly willing

To bathe their hearts in later moonlight,

Knowing that they can bring back thought

In the night that is still to be silent,

Reflecting this thing and that,

Before they sleep!

It is better that, as scholars,

They should think hard in the dark cuffs

Of voluminous cloaks,

And shave their heads and bodies.

It might well be that their mistress

Is no gaunt fugitive phantom.

She might, after all, be a wanton,

Abundantly beautiful, eager,

Fecund,

From whose being by starlight, on sea-coast,

The innermost good of their seeking

Might come in the simplest of speech.

It is a good light, then, for those

That know the ultimate Plato,

Tranquilizing with the jewel

The torments of confusion.

(from, Stevens, Collected Poetry & Prose, 20-21)

*                       *                       *                       *                       *

Another poem about the role of imagination, of the value of the faculty that connects us to the Pure Ideas, the perfect order beyond this world.  Who is living in that realm?  ‘drunkards, poets, widows/and ladies soon to be married.’ 

A lovely poem.  with lines like those of Pablo Neruda: “By this light the salty fishes/Arch in the sea like tree-brances,/Going in many directions/ Up and down.”

The philosophers may be 'scholars,' may be ascetics with 'shave(d) heads and bodies,' but thought itself, the subject of philosophers, may be far more feminine, more 'fecund,' more amply giving than they expect.  The best philosophers know the 'ultimate Plato,' that all ideas, all thoughts, are mediated by the imagination.  The calm of the ultimate order of the Ideas is 'tranquilizing' to the confused mind. As a former theologian, I know that religion, with its calming and ordering effects, is also based in imagination.

A homunculus is (according to www.dictionary.com)

1. A miniature, fully formed individual believed by adherents of the early biological theory of preformation to be present in the sperm cell.

Stevens may have used this word for its humorous effect juxtaposed with the elegant French 'la belle etoile,' the beautiful star.  The 'emerald evening star' is Venus.  The homunculus is, jocosely, Stevens, and was a pre-scientific concept, back when chemistry was alchemy.  An alternate title might have been "The poet and his inspiring star," with star as Muse.  But Stevens is far less prosaic.

Can't you just imagine the contemplative younger Wallace Stevens "in the night that is still to be silent,/reflecting this thing and that,/before they sleep!" ?  A very intimate moment in poetry.

another weeping woman, by wallace stevens

Pour the unhappiness out

From your too bitter heart,

Which grieving does not sweeten.

Poison grows in this dark.

It is in the water of tears

Its black blooms rise.

The magnificent cause of being,

The imagination, the one reality

In this imagined world

Leaves you

With him for whom no phantasy moves,

And you are pierced by a death.

(from Stevens, Collected Poetry & Prose, p.19)

*     *     *     *

This poem is not much commented upon in the literature, but must refer to the war widows, grieving girlfriends and mothers and sisters who lost young men in the Great War (wwi).  Timely.  Certainly this poem was written in 1921, three years after the end of that war, but I do believe that the worst of grief sets in some time after the initial shock and bereavement.  As time goes by, the finality of the loss really begins to set in.  Alike, Americans and Iraqis must 'gird our loins' to face this in the future. 

the doctor of geneva, by wallace stevens

The doctor of Geneva stamped the sand
That lay impounding the Pacific swell,
Patted his stove-pipe hat and tugged his shawl.

Lacustrine man had never been assailed
By such long-rolling opulent cataracts,
Unless Racine or Bossuet held the like.

He did not quail. A man so used to plumb
The multifarious heavens felt no awe
Before these visible, voluble delugings,

Which yet found means to set his simmering mind
Spinning and hissing with oracular
Notations of the wild, the ruinous waste,

Until the steeples of his city clanked and sprang
In an unburgherly apocalypse.
The doctor used his handkerchief and sighed.

(from, Stevens Collected Poetry and Prose, p. 19)

* * * *

There is some debate about the identity of the doctor of

Geneva

. Perhaps Calvin is meant, but there are other possibilities as well. At any rate, the supposition seems to be that the european religion to which Stevens was heir, is provincial, 'lacustrine,' too narrowly contained, compared to the vast ocean of imagination and new cultural frontiers available when one 'crosses the great waters,' namely the ocean separating the new and old worlds, both geographically, and also in terms of the turn of the century, an era that seemed, at the time and since, to mark a distinct ideological change.  A major paradigm shift.  The present rise in religious fundamentalism would probably greatly surprise Stevens and his contemporaries.  As if that is not enough, there is next the great Pacific to encounter, along with its non-theistic and polytheistic cultures and philosophical principles. 

Stevens approaches his topic in a light-hearted, slightly comic, tone.  The climax of the poem demonstrates how discombobulating an experience the confrontation of lacustrine man by

unplummed

 

Ocean

really is: "the steeples of his city clanked and sprang/In an unburgherly apocalypse./" 

The last line of the poem, 'the doctor used his handkerchief and sighed,' is particularly opaque, but someone traced down the following quotation from Henry James, published in the July 1874 issue of Galaxy, (possibly read by WS in his youth), that reads as follows: "Will you hear how they pass Sundays in Geneva? ...as soon as the text is named the minister puts on his hat, in which he is followed by the whole congregation. At the proper point of the discourse the minister stops short and turns his back to you to blow his nose, which is a signal for the congregation to do the same, and a glorious concert it is for the weather is already severe and people have got colds."  Odd, but possibly enlightening as to the significance of this final line.

I must confess that as a child in church I often wondered at the concert of coughing, nose-blowing, harrumphing and sniffling that seemed to be considered appropriate behavior during the most solemn rites.  It seems to be a western thing.  Church as the fit occasion for cleaning out the pipes - !?  Or perhaps Stevens includes this gesture as an indicator that even 'the doctor' may subconsciously believe his 'provincial doctrine' to be 'a lot of hooey,' as noseblowing seems to signify.

As to the references to Racine and Bossuet; in a sense, the fact that these names are virtually meaningless, even when recognized, by people today, works well in this poem, which is basically saying that the Christian thought of the past is obsolete.  Bossuet was a proponent of the divine right of kings.  He died about a hundred years before the French Revolution. 

Racine

was a Jansenist.  Here is Wikipedia's definition of Jansenism: "

Jansenism emphasized original sin, human depravity, the necessity of divine grace, and predestination. In Jansenist thought, human beings were born bad, and without divine help a human being could never become good. This meant that one had to be very careful about one's choices, exhibit a high level of piety and moral rectitude, and prepare carefully through prayer and confession before receiving Communion (hence they favored less frequent reception). The Jansenist idea of predestination, based on Augustine's writing and close to that of Calvinism, was that only a small number of human beings, the "elect", were destined to be saved."  So these two cultural icons of seventeenth century France, who may have once upon a time represented "long-rolling opulent cataracts,' are now 'washed away' by 'these visible, voluble delugings,' of the present era, the wider world of the twentieth century, in search of a new 'enchantment' coherent with its new sciences, especially physics and psychology.

fabliau of florida, by wallace stevens

Barque of phosphor
On the palmy beach,

Move outward into heaven,
Into the alabasters
And night blues.

Foam and cloud are one.
Sultry moon-monsters
Are dissolving.

Fill your black hull
With white moonlight.

There will never be an end
To this droning of the surf.

(from, Stevens, Collected Poetry & Prose, p.18)

* * * *

I see the ‘barque of phosphor’ as the imagination, the ‘inner light’ of visionary creativity. I read where another poet thought the ‘barque’ was the poet’s hand, writing poetry. It’s a nice enough idea, but the way he got there was a little bit convoluted. Anyway, why can’t the ‘barque of phosphor’ be simply ‘the imagination’, and ‘the alabasters/and night blues./’ the field of the imagination?

Maybe it’s because the imagination gets such bad press these days. It’s seen as only fit for children’s movies and sci-fi films. Imagination is widely despised in our culture as the stuff of unreal fantasy. The truth of imagination is not known. This is the case even though imagination underlies all our highly-valued scientific discoveries, many of our business successes, and all our religions.

Stevens was always careful that the imagination and the real should be close bed-fellows in his poetry. This is part of what makes him the ideal poet.

I love this poem, it’s beautiful. The imagination, ‘barque of phosphor’ (such a lovely trope), is on the verge of another realm. It is ‘on the palmy beach,’ about to voyage forth ‘into heaven.’ What is ‘heaven’ here? Is it the realm of Plato’s Ideas? Is it some kind of higher or ‘other’ reality that is nevertheless a part of our world? The ‘alabasters and night blues’ are such pure intensities of color, and would be identified in daoist language as representative of the ‘void’, the bright, dark field of potential, of chaos aka all possibilities. In this heavenly realm, shapes shift into one another (‘foam and cloud are one/sultry moon-monsters are dissolving’). There will never be an end to these possibilities, to these shape-shiftings, ‘to this droning of the surf.’

As you may notice from my other blog, I’m reading about gnositicism again. And I’m thinking to myself, Wallace Stevens is certainly a poet of Gnostics. Perhaps I ought to change my blog name to the ‘Gnosis of Wallace Stevens.’ I’m having so much fun with Karen King’s ‘The Gospel of Mary of Magdala’ that I’m now re-reading Elaine Pagel’s ‘The Gnostic Gospels.’ The gnostics were visionaries who appreciated the oneness of light and its many forms, namely the many images that communicate the light to us.

For Stevens, the ‘foam and the cloud are one,’ just different forms of water; one is earthly, one is ‘heavenly.’ ‘Moon-monsters are dissolving’; the fears or other horrific visions that may arise in the mind prove themselves to be nothing but dream-images that dissolve, that shift shape and identity, just like everything else in nature. This sort of thing is taught as ‘wisdom’ in Gnostic circles. It’s strange, there are plenty of Gnostics around, we just don’t call them that anymore, and it’s really not much of an issue in religion. But there is still a strong distrust of the imagination. I’m sure we’d all rather that Stevens’ meant his hand rather than the imagination in this poem.

There are ways in which Stevens is NOT a gnostic, however.  I don't think he sees the created world as inherently dark and evil.  Well, perhaps my research will shed more light on this topic as I go along.  At any rate, Stevens, the gnostics, and all of us have to find a way to deal with the fact that the physical world offers pleasures and delights, but also major challenges at the same time, death being not the least.  And that humans have the creative ability to make up stories about it, to make music, and art, and poetry that seem, at least, to suggest something more...but what?  It always seems to come down to faith, some kind of faith, perhaps a religious faith, perhaps a philosophical faith, perhaps a nihilistic faith, perhaps a scientific faith.  I'm very interested to see where Stevens seems to come down on all of this.  There is a story circulating that he became a Catholic at the end of his life.  If so the Catholics are supposed to hold a 'sacramental' view of the created world, but there is a strong strain of gnositicism running through its tradition, thanks in the main to Augustine.

hibiscus on the sleeping shores, by wallace stevens

I say now, Fernando, that on that day
The mind roamed as a moth roams,
Among the blooms beyond the open sand;

And that whatever noise the motion of the waves
Made on the sea-weeds and the covered stones
Disturbed not even the most idle ear.

Then it was that that monstered moth
Which had lain folded against the blue
And the colored purple of the lazy sea,

And which had drowsed along the bony shores,
Shut to the blather that the water made,
Rose up besprent and sought the flaming red

Dabbled with yellow pollen - red as red
As the flag above the old cafe -
And roamed there all the stupid afternoon.

(from, Stevens Collected Poetry & Prose, p. 18)

* * * *

This poem is at first reminiscent of some of Stevens' earliest poems, which were more conventional in subject matter and presentation, and described songbirds, weather, and so forth. It flows like they do, and induces a drowsy, dreamy haze like a day at the seashore will do. But with a difference. For example, even though we may enjoy a 'stupid afternoon' by the seaside, we rarely call it that, especially in the context of a poem, which is supposed to be comprised of especially aesthetical language. In a poem, we don't say 'stupid afternoon' even if it is true. At least, we didn't say 'stupid afternoon' in a poem prior to the twentieth century, prior to poets like Stevens!

We wouldn't have said, or rather, Keats wouldn't have said, 'stupid afternoon,' or 'monstered moth' or 'bony shores' even though, in this last case, it is scientifically quite correct, but has not been considered to be aesthetically correct prior to Stevens.

I came across two sentences I like in the Letters, that seem to apply to this, and to the last two poems recently reviewed: "One of my ideals is to make everything expressive, and thus true. I would like to get out of line."

Having just gone back to standard time, I appreciate reviewing this poem right now. A 'stupid' day in the sun at the beach sounds great.

more on Ursula

As usual, Bill Ford has found a key linking this poem to Stevens’ muse, Sibyl Gage, whose birthday was the same as the feast-day of Ursula, the patron saint of educators, of which Sibyl was one. He also finds parallels between this poem and Keats’ ‘La Belle Dame Sans Merci.’ And it would seem as if Stevens’ experienced Sibyl as just such a cruel lady.

I looked back through Stevens' letters and journal entries for whatever might have been written around the time of his encounter with Sibyl in the Adirondacks in 1902. He gave her a poem, meant as a compliment, but that dissed her two favorite authorities in the field of education, after which there was no more to their story. (See my entries on Le Monocle de Mon Oncle, for more on this topic) That was in August of '02. Anyway, I found this entry, dated October 8, 1902, that seems to apply to the Sibyl Gage poem, and to his apparent feeling that he had been ‘cut’ by her in response to it.

“It is true, doubtless, as some one was saying to me to-day, that, though women are vain, men are vainer. I was told that if a woman met a man with an atrocious nose and said to him, “What fine lines your face has!” he would cry “Nonsense!” – and be found admiring his abominable proboscis in a mirror shortly after, wondering that he had never before noticed that the line were fine. Yes: that is probably true. An unattractive woman can draw almost any man to her by discreet flattery; but when a man flatters a woman the woman doesn’t feel any the kindlier toward the man but takes his praise as quite true + winds up by cutting him – as not quite good enough for so fair a creature. Flattery mollifies a man; elevates a woman. Voila!” (LWS, p.61)

Aside from the various possibilities as to the identity of Stevens' muse, etcetera, this poem has a ceremonial feel that shows Stevens attunement to ritual. This supports my theory that matters spiritual were more important to him than not. He is always trying to integrate the spiritual with the material. In our western tradition these are either separated or else matter stands in need of being consecrated, redeemed, etc. "'But here,' she said,/'Where none can see,/I make an offering, in the grass,/Of radishes and flowers.'/And then she wept/For fear the Lord would not accept." But why not simply see them as different aspects of the same thing? (Like radishes and flowers)