William Carlos Williams

For an individual who enjoys writing poetry I must say that I am very bad about reading other poets.  However, last week, while I was browsing the library’s online databases, I found one, the ”Granger’s Poetry Database” which has a huge collection of full text poems.  I found myself reading a lot of William Carlos Williams poems as I looked around in the database.  I believe my favorite poem by Williams is the short little verse entitled “The Red Wheelbarrow” which reads:

so much depends
upon

a red wheel
barrow

glazed with rain
water

beside the white
chickens

It is such a simple, subtle, and short piece of literature and yet to me it paints this beautiful image.  I remember when I first encountered it junior year of college, in Poetry Workshop, wanting very badly to be able to emulate the precise physical simplicity of it.  I tried on a number of my own poems but feel that I repeatedly fell short.  I am certain that some critics are not big fans of either “The red Wheelbarrow” or William Carlos Williams but to me both are genius.  I find Williams’ verses to be very relaxing, they remind me, in some ways, of pieces of soft quiet piano music that one can feel comfortable falling asleep to.

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Tags: poetry, the red wheelbarrow, William Carlos Williams, writing

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