Today, looking upstream and being glad I found that clematis in the weeds!
Engraved
A man and a woman
sit by the riverbank.
He fishes,
she reads.
The fish are not biting.
She has not turned the page
for an hour.
The light around them
holds itself taut,
no shadow moves,
but the sky and the woods,
look, are dark.
Night has advanced upon them.
Denise Levertov
The Life Around Us; selected poems on nature,
New Directions, 1997, page 13.
"Levertov distinguishes organic form from free verse. Most free verse, she argues, aims for truth and precision particular to each line, but is inattentive to the relationship between lines. Organic form, on the other hand, attends first to the shape and rhythm of the entire poem, and individual lines may be shifted in accordance with that poem’s movement and shape as a whole."
"Levertov distinguishes organic form from free verse. Most free verse, she argues, aims for truth and precision particular to each line, but is inattentive to the relationship between lines. Organic form, on the other hand, attends first to the shape and rhythm of the entire poem, and individual lines may be shifted in accordance with that poem’s movement and shape as a whole."
From Poetryfoundation.org in the Introduction to Levertov's important essay, "Some Notes on Organic Form" (1965) The essay is available at this link.
Carefully examine the short poem above with this quotation in mind. And sleep well. . .
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