In any discussion of the prose poem, visual art becomes a topic. Though art is inevitably addressed in prose poem studies, art inspires other writers as well. This is simply ignored due to its general prevalence. There are many to look at, but one I recently read is Marianne Moore's poem "When I Buy Pictures". I appreciate this poem because she discusses the incredibly prosaic reasons that a normal person does purchase this or that picture.
When I Buy Pictures
or what is closer to the truth,
when I look at that of which I may regard myself as the imaginary possessor,
I fix upon what would give me pleasure in my average moments:
the satire upon curiosity in which no more is discernible than the intensity of the mood;
or quite the opposite—the old thing, the medieval decorated hat-box,
in which there are hounds with waists diminishing like the waist of the hour-glass,
and deer and birds and seated people;
it may be no more than a square of parquetry; the literal biography perhaps,
in letters standing well apart upon a parchment-like expanse;
an artichoke in six varieties of blue; the snipe-legged hieroglyphic in three parts;
the silver fence protecting Adam's grave, or Michael taking Adam by the wrist.
Too stern an intellectual emphasis upon this quality or that detracts from one's enjoyment.
It must not wish to disarm anything; nor may the approved triumph easily be honored—
that which is great because something else is small.
It comes to this: of whatever sort it is,
it must be "lit with piercing glances into the life of things";
it must acknowledge the spiritual forces which have made it.
Leaving Kandinsky and Hegel to the side, because I don't want here to begin thinking about Spirit, I smile at her opening. "When I buy pictures" is the way I would begin a sentence too, though only ever having bought one I would wonder if picking among pieces the artist has offered could count in the approach to this topic, and probably decide that there was something different about it too complicated to incorporate, thus switching indeed to what it feels like to imagine a piece coming home with me, an experience with which I am far more familiar.
I look at a piece, considering what it would be like to live with it day in and day out, through lovers, cats, interests, homes, and whether it is likely to move with me through those other experiences I can not yet conceive. There is no way to tell though I have the piece that I bought, and the pieces I have been given hanging still which suggests that the act of choosing the piece gives it a permanent relationship to my life that I can never understand when I am selecting.
Marianne Moore had in fact only a few years prior to this poem made the decision to buy several Copley reproductions of Blake prints of Milton's Paradise Lost. She had been thinking about this decision for nine years. Buying a picture isn't necessarily an impromptu decision. And some years later, the picture hanging on the wall can find itself not only a part of your life, but a part of your mind, so that scribbling at her words, Marianne Moore brought the pictures into her art.
"Too stern an intellectual emphasis upon this quality or that detracts from one's enjoyment."
Agreed Ms. Moore, but how interesting then to consider the redrafting of this poem: changes to the words, a shift from its original syllabic design, a clearer mention of the pictures. And perhaps that is the danger in thinking about it too long, you never get to enjoy it. Because if you think about it for long enough, you can reason yourself past the piercing glance that the picture gave you, that stopped you long enough to linger, look, and if luck took a liking to you, let you love it enough to lug it home where it looks back at you, lit by the life of your things.
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