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Amy Lowell


Everett Shinn. Girl in Bathtub (1903). pastel on paper.


from Spring Day

Bath 

The day is fresh-washed and fair, and there is a smell of tulips and narcissus in the air. 

The sunshine pours in at the bath-room window and bores through the water in the bath-tub in lathes and planes of greenish-white. It cleaves the water into flaws like a jewel, and cracks it to bright light. 

Little spots of sunshine lie on the surface of the water and dance, dance, and their reflections wobble deli ciously over the ceiling; a stir of my finger sets them whirring, reeling. I move a foot, and the planes of light in the water jar. I lie back and laugh, and let the green white water, the sun-flawed beryl water, flow over me. The day is almost too bright to bear, the green water covers me from the too bright day. I will lie here awhile and play with the water and the sun spots. 

The sky is blue and high. A crow flaps by the window, and there is a whiff of tulips and narcissus in the air. 


John Ashbery

  The New Spirit (excerpt) I thought that if I could put it all down, that would be one way. And next the thought came to me that to leave a...