Ezra Pound's Apparition

Ezra Pound's Apparition

When I called for the

Direct treatment of the thing,

Ezra Pound saw at once that if

Words are to be as things,

Language must be man-made.

And when I called for the

Other sex to be remade as

Objects, Pound went further and

Converted an entire crowd into a

Bough with blossoms.

But why 'apparition,' I asked.

It's hardly a thing at all.

And ‘petals on a wet, black bough’

Sounds too pastoral, unmanly even,

Not what I expected at all.