Lumpy pudding

Judging a poem is like judging a pudding or a machine. One demands that it work. Poetry succeeds because all or most of what is said or implied is relevant; what is irrelevant has been excluded, like lumps from pudding and 'bugs' from machinery. (Wimsatt & Beardsley)

Here we celebrate the excluded, lumpy parts of the pudding!

Jun 23, 2012 8:48pm
Anna Akhmatova: White Night Oh, I’ve not locked the door, I’ve not lit the candles, You know I’m too tired To think of sleep. See, how the fields die down, In the sunset gloom of firs, And I’m drunk on the sound Of your voice, echoing here. It’s fine, that all’s black, That life’s – a cursed hell. O, that you’d come back – I was so certain, as well.

Anna Akhmatova: White Night

Oh, I’ve not locked the door,
I’ve not lit the candles,
You know I’m too tired
To think of sleep.

See, how the fields die down,
In the sunset gloom of firs,
And I’m drunk on the sound
Of your voice, echoing here.

It’s fine, that all’s black,
That life’s – a cursed hell.
O, that you’d come back –
I was so certain, as well.

Page 1 of 1