ON THE ROAD HOME

The illuminating Wallace Stevens' poem ON THE ROAD HOME comes immediately before the poem I have featured in the post below this, at least it does so in my 534 pp volume of this poet's collected works, and I suspect there are many good reasons for this being so.

I see connections between the two poems and I will highlight some of the text of ON THE ROAD . . . with a view to signposting the route, as I see it, to the connections and thereby to the finding of the poet's 'points of view' as I like to think of them, and thereby towards understanding.

ON THE ROAD HOME

It was when I said,

"There is no such thing as the truth,"

That the grapes seemed fatter.

The fox ran out of his hole.

You . . . You said,

"There are many truths,

But they are not parts of a truth."

Then the tree, at night, began to change,

Smoking through green and smoking blue.

We were two figures in a wood.

We said we stood alone.

It was when I said,

"Words are not forms of a single word

In the sum of the parts, there are only the parts.

The world must be measured by eye";

It was when you said,

"The idols have seen lots of poverty,

Snakes and gold and lice,

But not the truth";

It was at that time, that the silence was largest

And longest, the night was roundest,

The fragrance of the autumn warmest,

Closest and strongest.

_______

Wallace Stevens