XX11

so much
depends

upon a red wheel
barrow

glazed with rain
water

beside the white
chickens

from Spring and All ( 1923 )
William Carlos Williams
( 1883 - 1963 )

Did William Carlos Williams anticipate, the topsy turvy climate we are experiencing these days when we get bombarded incessantly with election news, as he wrote this thoroughly analyzed and often quoted poem in 1923 ? I doubt it !

Many fledgling poets use Williams' admonition of "so much depends upon" when they are stuck at getting started with the opening line of a new poem. In fact, what in life is devoid of dependence upon something other than the obvious ? I, myself, have used this concept to get unstuck from a brain drain but, I'm sure, many out there think I'm perennially brain drained.

Many times we need to read a poem numerous times for us to absorb the unsaid, as well as, the said conveyed by the assemblage of words, phrases, and verses of the poem. It is left for each of us to get from a poem something, something could be the simplicity of a feeling or the excitement of getting yourself to write a piece of your own doing.

Please, for your own sake, don't wait until, like me, you're on your last hurrah. Simply put, it is just putting the best words in the best order you can muster up. Neither Mim Ludwig nor Kenny Gable are still on earth waiting to pounce on your spelling or punctuation. You become the master of your own ship ordering it to cast off and set sail for wherever your destination. Let others be the mates, you be the Captain at the wheel giving orders. Eventually, you'll realize words become more and more important and their relationship to each other a positive. Set sail with words and voyage forever.

Ronald C. Downie