Modpo - Week 3 - The rise of poetic modernism - Imagism

        In week 3 there was an introduction of Imagism in poetry and when we read the poem how different images pops up in our mind. There were many poems of imagism like H. D.’s “Sea Rose” and “Sea Poppies”, Ezra Pound’s “In a station of the Metro” and “The Encounter”, William Carlos William’s “Lines”, “Between Walls” and “The Red Wheelbarrow”.

I have taken two poems here. First is by Ezra Pound “In a station of the Metro”

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      1)   "In a station of the Metro" - Ezra Pound

       

  The apparition of these faces in the Crowd;

  Petals on a wet, black bough

      The word “Metro” in title clearly suggests the image of hasty lifestyle of modern civilization. “these faces in the Crowd” suggests that people  are together in crowd but isolated. The metaphor of “wet, black bough” suggests that they are from same tree (city, civilization) but that civilization is like “withered stump” and they are like petals, isolated from flower without identity. The word “apparition” used because the poem is not just about the visual image but also about how it is perceived its after image or “apparition”.

The second poem is “Between Walls” by William Carlos Williams.

2)   "Between Walls" - William Carlos Williams

the back wings
of the
hospital where
nothing
will grow lie
cinders
in which shine
the broken
pieces of a green
bottle

       If we read the poem we could find that there is an image of hospital. In the back wing of hospital there will grow nothing. But the broken piece of a green bottle is shining. The first image of hospital and then there is a statement that nothing will grow and suddenly the piece of green bottle is shining. If we connect the dots we find that the significance of this image for the currents of formal experimentation in the twentieth century is newness in artificial manmade things. The setting is hospital where nothing grows but it is also the place where people get life. The image of broken bottle piece, it is broken but still it shines.