Poet 15: Ezra Pound

Background: Ezra Pound was born in 1885 in Hailey of the Idaho Territory. He was a leader of the modernist movement in poetry. He advanced the work of Americans like Frost, Williams, Hemingway, and Eliot in addition to Irish writers Yeats and Joyce. He had radical political views, supported Mussolini, was a critic of the US involvement in World War II, and an anti-semite. A colorful character by all accounts! He was even arrested for treason but aquitted and determined he was insane!

Now, to his poetry . . .

I thought he might be like Gross Ginsberg (forever will be my name for his creepy poetry), but it was very well-crafted and beautiful. I just didn't understand a whole lot of it! LOL! He uses many Greek illusions, and I am glad I have a bit of background in this. He promulgated Imagism which borrows from classical Japanese and Chinese poetry.

Though I didn't always understand him, I liked him.

This poem got the most comments on AmericanPoems.com:

In a Station of the Metro

The apparition of these faces in the crowd;

Petals on a wet, black bough.