[Skip Navigation]

Plagiarist Poetry Sites: Plagiarist.com | Poetry X | Poetry Discussion Forums | Open Poetry Project | Joycean.org
Enter our Poetry Contest
Win Cash and Publication!

Plagiarist.com Archive

Read more poems by Wallace Stevens: Wallace Stevens Poems at Poetry X.

More poems by Wallace StevensWallace Stevens | Print this page.Print | View and Write CommentsComments | Books by Wallace StevensBooks by Wallace Stevens

The Sense Of The Sleight-Of-Hand Man

Wallace Stevens

One's grand flights, one's Sunday baths,
One's tootings at the weddings of the soul
Occur as they occur. So bluish clouds
Occurred above the empty house and the leaves
Of the rhododendrons rattled their gold,
As if someone lived there. Such floods of white
Came bursting from the clouds. So the wind
Threw its contorted strength around the sky.

Could you have said the bluejay suddenly
Would swoop to earth? It is a wheel, the rays
Around the sun. The wheel survives the myths.
The fire eye in the clouds survives the gods.
To think of a dove with an eye of grenadine
And pines that are cornets, so it occurs,
And a little island full of geese and stars:
It may be the ignorant man, alone,
Has any chance to mate his life with life
That is the sensual, pearly spuse, the life
That is fluent in even the wintriest bronze.

Added: 24 Aug 2001 | Last Read: 7 Jun 2025 11:20 PM | Viewed: 4994 times

A PoetryNotes™ Analysis of The Sense Of The Sleight-Of-Hand Man by Wallace Stevens, is Available!

A PoetryNotes™ eBook is available for this poem for delivery within 24 hours, and usually available within minutes during normal business hours.

ON SALE - only $29.95 19.95!

For more information...


URL: http://plagiarist.com/poetry/1029/ | Viewed on 7 June 2025.
Copyright ©2025 Plagiarist - All rights reserved.