The Uses Of Poetry in  General   

I've fond anticipation of a day
O'erfilled with pure diversion presently,
For I must read a lady poesy
The while we glide by many a leafy bay,

Hid deep in rushes, where at random play
The glossy black winged May-flies, or whence flee
Hush-throated nestlings in alarm,
Whom we have idly frighted with our boat's long sway.

For, lest o'ersaddened by such woes as spring
To rural peace from our meek onward trend,
What else more fit? We'll draw the latch-string

And close the door of sense; then satiate wend,
On poesy's transforming giant wing,
To worlds afar whose fruits all anguish mend.

By William Carlos Williams

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Other poems by William Carlos Williams:

• A Celebration
• A Goodnight
• A Sort Of A Song
• Approach Of Winter
• April Is The Saddest Month
• Aux Imagistes
• Berket And The Stars
• Blizzard
• Complaint
• Complete Destruction
• Danse Russe
• Dedication For A Plot Of Ground
• from "Asphodel, That Greeny Flower"
• Heel & Toe To The End
• Item
• Landscape With The Fall Of Icarus
• Light Hearted Author
• Light Hearted William
• Love Song
• Muier
• Nantucket
• Overture To A Dance Of Locomotives
• Pastoral
• Poem (As the cat)
• Portrait Of A Lady
• Romance Moderne
• Spring And All
• Suzanne
• Sympathetic Portrait Of A Child
• The Cold Night
• The Crowd At The Ball Game
• The Dance
• The Defective Record
• The Desolate Field
• The Disputants
• The Great Figure
• The Hunters in the Snow
• The Ivy Crown
• The Last Words Of My English Grandmother
• The Late Singer
• The Poem
• The Red Wheelbarrow
• The Soughing Wind
• The Term
• The Thing
• The Uses Of Poetry
• The Young Housewife
• This Is Just To Say
• To A Friend
• To A Friend Concerning Several Ladies
• To A Poor Old Woman
• To Elsie
• To Waken An Old Lady
• Tract
• Willow Poem
• Winter Trees
• Youth And Beauty