Authors: Lorine Niedecker
Black as those beside Troy
but sailless tar-preserve-black fish barges
and orange and Chinese red rowboats
in which the three virtues
knowledge, humanity, energy
infrequently ride.
Ask me rather what kind of people
—here they kick the book of poetry open—
because you can't keep people from water
they'll cut thru to it 20
rut thru in the soft
dig under and come up in the middle,
by water they go for Helen
in water seek their own image
fish Sunday's quiet
by water uncork their beer
on days off
to see light behave
double moon on the wave
water where bobbed likely the first life on earth. 30
Right of way—
you can't keep em from it.
Ask me what kind of children.
Who are the kids of the calm-moving wet,
of Saturday-Sunday parents.
One with listening eyes like yours
little Sat Sun shall we say
sits in the thinning wild rice
watching wide sky wash
away from the laundry. 40
One.
What we have is the Sunday school crowd
laying waste the countryside
with their long sticks.
Beat the grass
whip Queen Anne's lace
bow low, my family of young poplars
oh holy day
The sons and the daughters
on their way to water, 50
your floaters, your doters,
your wigglers, your little pond scum
turtle torturers, danglers of frogs
in any mud puddle
your wuttle-gutt goop longs
—they can't talk—
the pings and the ack acks
dealing death to the little green thing
cute kids
kee-yute tribe 60
who at six steer the motor boat
straight to the dock
No they can't talk
they combust
or they mush it
Dennie's the spitwit kid
chewer of seaweed inland
juices, breaks up into acids
related to what was his name
who could speak no English 70
his tongue runneth all on buttered fish
yet asleep in his army blankets
as sweet a child as any
And there's always the army
to make a man of him.
Take his brother, 19,
no better butter-mutter
no clear song, fished out
left town
empty in the head 80
swish swash
but good with three bullets on a knife
After me
backward
the cockpit
fell out
Give me silk
or nylon
and down
with your art 90
You saw Guppy the fleet type submarine, Paul
I give you Gulpy
To hear him
he could hold up his arm
and keep the bomb from falling
or he could drop it.
Frog jabber
grab her
she's mine to pierce
ready for love 100
Gloater, soaker, roaring river boater
emptied, poured out, done,
stick out your tongue
mammoth oar-muscle baby
The day of the giant armored fishes
was a clear thing
Five-year-old Chief Noise
guns strewn over his lawn
his Uncle a Justice
held us up one night by the garden gate 110
throws the cat by the tail at noon
cries to get her in out of the rain
after dark
He'll take no backwash from anybody
What does the father do?
He steals. I mean
he works for a steel company.
Well, why not?—
steals from himself
as they from him 120
his time, his life.
His pleasure in his work
flows by.
He's left loved
for the spending of his wages
on things he won't want.
All children begin with the life of the mind—
if there were no marsh or stream
imagine it
99 children go into business 130
selling angleworms,
the hundredth develops free fingers in John Sebastian brook
Boys who play the fiddle never amount to anything
the storekeeper screamed
with the radio in his face
so he raised his son to shop work
turn screws, grind scissors
and in the end own stores
force his rivals to the wall then buy em out
selling and buying 140
how are you dying
worn out at fifty
nevermind the mind
while poets and players
of serious song
stand the stress
All along the water
50,000 crusading children
beat their way to the pretty sea shells.
Find yourself a starfish and you'll see the sea open 150
And still there's no miracle.
Sold into slavery
sold
Brother
sold to the factory assembly line
for “a worthwhile goal—an automobile”
costing more than my house.
The boy overshot his goal at dusk
hit a cow on the road
that carried no lantern 160
jumped over the moon
slid into a grave ready-blossoming
—wild mustard and quack—
the car repaired
sold
Road boat upset
hooked as by love
the greatest thrill
since his tongue froze to the pump handle
this is the boy who'd defend you in war 170
and so doing crush you
haul over and love you
When other friendships are forgot
yours will still be hot
Put that in your Opus
5 f's for forte
One boy there was with a camera:
“I need nests 6 or 7 feet from the ground
and on which the sun shines
most of the day. Prothonotary, please. 180
I'm told if anybody knows where these nests are
it will be you.”
He was a minister's son
I never saw him—
driven off his course by the wind
Comes a measure marked autumn
the passing of the little summer people,
schools of leaves float downstream
past lonely piers
soft still-water twilight 190
morning ice on the minnow bucket
Riddle me this:
book
brook
Bach
unlock
ships'
gifts
and I'll tell you
how freedom grows 200
Two other MS versions of the five-page poem survive: one went to Dahlberg on Aug. 30, 1955, for inclusion in a proposed but never published anthology. It is titled “Part V of
FOR PAUL,
9 year old violinist” and it includes the following variants:
line 3: are bound for England?
lines 5-8: The direct speech is enclosed in quotation marks.
line 66: “Dennie” is replaced by “Danny”.
lines 175-76 (“Put that…forte”) are omitted and replaced by the following excerpt from an early and subsequently rejected (see p. 136) “
FOR PAUL
” poem:
The elegant office girl
is power-rigged.
She carries her nylon hard-pointed
breast uplift
like parachutes
half-pulled.
The third long MS version of the poem is in FPOP with the following variants:
line 3: are to be bound for England?
lines 5-8: The direct speech is enclosed in quotation marks.
line 66: “Dennie” is replaced by “Reggy,”
line 126: “The elegant office girl” lines above are inserted between “on things he won't want” and “All children begin…”.
The “
FOR PAUL: CHILD VIOLINIST
” selection in
Quarterly Review of Literature
8.2 (1955): 117-19, included what LN described in an Aug. 30, 1955, letter to Dahlberg as a “section” of the long poem “Dear Paul”: lines 1-16 (“dear Paul:…in frequently ride.”) and lines 127-32 (“All children begin…John Sebastian Brook”). Here is her Nov. 16, 1955, statement to Dahlberg: “The reason I took a section out (for
Quart. Rev. of Lit.)
of the long
FOR PAUL
poem I sent you was that it wasn't going with editors as it was and the mood of those few lines seemed to fit in with the others for Weiss [ed. of
QRL
]. But I have always felt that that long poem, section V of the series which I called
FOR PAUL,
is a whole, a rangy, perhaps too long poem but nevertheless a poem.”
The poem “
Autumn
” in
Poor.Old.Tired.Horse
. 9 (undated, possibly 1965): 1, is drawn from lines 188-91 of “Dear Paul” (see p.217).
T&G
and
MLBW
duplicate the
QRL
version to which they add lines 10-14 from “Your father to me in your eighth summer” (see p. 146) followed and concluded by lines 186-91 (“Comes a measure marked autumn”…“morning ice on the minnow bucket”).
The
T&G
and
MLBW
versions make two revisions: line 16 reads, “Sometimes ride.” and line 28 (of the present text) reads, “Yes, comes a measure marked Autumn”.
MLBW
differs from
T&G
in the addition of line 18: if there were no marsh or stream.
EA uses only lines 1-16, printing them in quatrains with an amended line 9: You ask what kind of boats
My father said “I remember
T&G, MLBW
[FPOP].
In poem I of “
FOR PAUL: GROUP SEVEN
” MS (undated, probably 1952/3) there is a second stanza:
Play those little records again
no sweeter music
than the violin.
The Aug. 30, 1955, MS sent to Dahlberg adds an additional line to the start of the second stanza, “Now I enjoy the stove” and revises “records” to “discs”.
FPOP revises line 11 to “Now I need a stove”.
Revised to the present text for “
THREE POEMS,
”
Granta
71.12456 (1964/5): 19.
Origin
ser. 3, 2 (July 1966): 9.
No quotation marks used until
MLBW.
You know, he said, they used to make
T&G, MLBW
[FPOP].
In poem II of “
FOR PAUL: GROUP SEVEN
” MS (undated, probably 1952/3) and in FPOP, lines 1-2 read:
The old man said you know they used
to make mincemeat with meat,
He built four houses
MFT, T&G, MLBW
[FPOP, EA, VV].
Poem III of “
FOR PAUL: GROUP SEVEN
” (undated, probably 1952/3).
In a numbered group of “
FOUR POEMS,
”
Black Mountain Review
6 (Spring 1956): 192.
In Europe they grow a new bean while here
T&G, MLBW
[FPOP].
An undated early MS:
In Russia they grow a new bean (being) while here
we tie bundles of grass
with a strand of itself as they used to American grain
—against the cold blast
around my house—my neighbor: Do yet in Russia I guess
From his sister in Maine: We've found a nice warm place
(in the hay?)
for the winter. Charlie sleeps late, I'm glad for his sake,
it shortens the day.
Around my house in America yet.
variant final line: Around my house old bean in America yet.
A second MS, dated Dec. 1, 1951, shows the following line revisions:
line 1: In Russia they grow a new bean while here
line 3: With strands of itself as they used to American grain,
line 10: Around my house the old bean in America yet.
Poem IV in “
FOR PAUL: GROUP SEVEN
” (undated, probably 1952/3) revises:
line 3: with strands of itself—as my grandfolks used to grain
line 5: From my cousin in Maine: We've found a nice warm place
The rest of the poem is revised to the present text.
A change from “Russia” to “Europe” is marked on the above MS in LZ's hand. However, in “Changes in
FOR PAUL
” (Jan. 29, 1955), LN notes: “I kept: In Russia they grow a new bean but changed Russia to Europe!” The change is hers and it occurs two or three years after the above MS. My speculation is that LZ would have retrieved his copy of the undated (probably 1952/3) MS in order to examine her revision and, at the same time, would have inscribed her change.