On Stevens

Last night, in my disjointed way, I read a few poems of Wallace Stevens' (my first). I did not read many, but instead read those few through several times, trying to wrap my mind around them. Those that I've read remind me a bit of Rilke.

From "The Motive for Metaphor:"

The obscure moon lighting an obscure world
Of things that would never be quite expressed,
Where you yourself were never quite yourself
And did not want nor have to be,

Desiring the exhilarations of changes:
The motive for metaphor, shrinking from
The weight of primary noon,
The A B C of being

I love those lines. The more I read them, the more they remind me of reading, of writing. Things never quite expressed -- and never quite grasped. The writer partially expressing, the reader partially understanding, and yet both finding something there. Finding something here.