John Berryman

 

Oct. 25 marked the centennial of the poet John Berryman, who was Harvard's Briggs-Copeland Lecturer on English from 1940 to 1943. Berryman jumped from the Washington Avenue Bridge in Minneapolis in 1972 at the age of 57.

Dream Song 28: Snow Line

It was wet & white & swift and where I am
we don't know. It was dark and then
it isn't.
I wish the barker would come. There seems to be to eat
nothing. I am unusually tired.
I'm alone too.

If only the strange one with so few legs would come,
I'd say my prayers out of my mouth, as usual.
Where are his notes I loved?
There may be horribles; it's hard to tell.
The barker nips me but somehow I feel
he too is on my side.

I'm too alone. I see no end. If we could all
run, even that would be better. I am hungry.
The sun is not hot.
It's not a good position I am in.
If I had to do the whole thing over again
I wouldn't.

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...