This poem is one of the few that has a date . It also shows a first draft that Evelyn herself marked and changed. Each time I read her work, I am struck by the richness and scope of her extraordinary vocabulary.
1940 was six years after her mother died and also the beginning of WWII in Europe. I do not know if she had moved to Detroit by this time or was still in Cleveland. I suspect the former. The 1940 Census will not be released until April 2, 2012 but it will be a good way to check.
On Hearing Schubert’s Serenade Unfinished Symphony
Hear now the noble sounds,
And watch the twilight blow
Its purple breath
Upon my tree of elm.
How like a violin with muted bow
Its sweeter-than-an-organ strings
Transpose my body
To blue orchil heights.
No more of flesh am I,
But wood long mingled
In great Orpheus’ wine,
No cloven splinter but would strike
A fantasia on the silent sky.
Ah! no mere fashioned wood, but primal tree
That rocks her pregnant boughs
Across the moon’s white
Stony wisp disc of light.
Then all of tree am I,
Green lips to drink the conquer rain,
Bud-hearts to hold the plunder sun,
And birds within me singing.
Hear now the noble sounds!
Evelyn Coffey 3/29/40
Evelyn told us that she wrote this on returning to her apartment from this music performed by an orchestra. She said that she was so full of the music that it was like it was still playing inside her, so she sat down and wrote this while the feeling was there.
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