The Red Wheelbarrow

"Poem I (Spring and All)" by William Carlos Williams (1923)

The titular work in the collection in which Poem XXII appeared, “Spring and All” (Poem I) captures the rigorous and slow process of spring reclaiming the scruffy fields around a hospital. Unlike more traditional spring poems, Williams here delights in immersing the poem in exact detailing, forsaking emotional indulgences and lyrical ornamentation to present a picture of an early spring day. In tone and in metrics, this is a helpful gloss to Poem XXII.

"Tall Nettles" by Edward Thomas (1916)

An expression of the lean and stripped visual argument of Imagism, this brief lyric captures in clear and undecorated language the landscape of a rural farm, specifically the delight the poet feels when he sees nettles, resilient flowers, pushing through rusting farm implements. As with Williams’ poem, the poet resists converting the image into a tidy lesson about nature, time, or mortality. Rather the poem delights in the colors, lines, and unexpected collision of shapes and textures.

"In a Station of the Metro" by Ezra Pound (1913)

Ezra Pound was the philosophical force behind the rise of Imagism. This couplet captures a moment in a Paris underground train station with its usual press of eager and hurried passengers.