Everand Logo

Welcome to Everand!

  • Discover millions of ebooks, audiobooks, and so much more with a free trial

    Only $11.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

    Personae
    Personae
    Personae
    Ebook99 pages42 minutes

    Personae

    By Ezra Pound

    4/5

    ()

    Read preview
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherArchive Classics
    Release dateJan 1, 1971
    Personae
    Author

    Ezra Pound

    Ezra Pound (1885–1972) is one of the most influential, and controversial, poets of the twentieth century. His poetry remains vital, challenging, contentious, unassimilable.

    Read more from Ezra Pound

    Related to Personae

    Related ebooks

    Related podcast episodes

    Related articles

    • Article

      from BLACK PASTORAL

      Nov 1, 2023

      somewheres, some lifetimes ago I have run so far, so long.There is nowhere I haven’t beenBut here, in this field, a bodyLength from the ragged brinkThat gives way to forest.I collapsed here, the thin, hard slipOf me whittled at both ends.I want badly

      4 min read

    • Article

      The Living Mandelstam

      May 1, 2020

      It is common for English-language accounts of Mandelstam’s life to begin with an account of his death. Consider the first sentence of a twosentence biography that appeared in The New York Review of Books in 2016 to preface a translation by Andrew Dav

      13 min read

    • Article

      Yukio Mishima in Ichigaya

      Aug 20, 2019

      Yukio Mishima in Ichigaya
      10 min read

    • Article

      Five Centos After Serhiy Zhadan

      Jan 1, 2022

      —based on first lines by Serhiy Zhadan Take only what is important. Take the letters,the dark shattered wicked winter. You hear everything passing,stories connected with murders, knife wounds. Remember how winter began in your town.The hot heart of t

      2 min read

    • Article

      Pre-order* Your Copy Today At

      Mar 9, 2021

      Pre-order* Your Copy Today At
      1 min read

    • Article

      DeLillo, Lethem, and the Seductive Sentence

      Apr 11, 2018

      DeLillo is so famously and distinctively a writer who appeals to sentence-lovers, with all their blindnesses, hubristic ideals, and narrow-minded cerebrations. The post DeLillo, Lethem, and the Seductive Sentence appeared first on The Millions.

      10 min read

    • Article

      Five Poems

      Nov 1, 2020

      He kept me through childhood.There was a reasonhe kept me from sin like a biscuitwarming in the oven.It’s okay I tell the rain to keep him a theorybut bring him downonce in a while.It’s okay to be honest or selfishbut find the spot where you sinka li

      2 min read

    • Article

      A Mournful Spring

      Mar 1, 2022

      in memory of Adam Zagajewski So many friends have you seen pass,maestro of the poetic eulogy. Now it’s my turn. Can you hear me?We don’t know. Why didn’t we spend more time together,talk more, call each other? I thought you’d live to be old,very ol

      1 min read

    • Article

      Five Poems

      Mar 1, 2022

      Five Poems
      5 min read

    • Article

      Jan Morris

      Jun 15, 2018

      I have always rather envied the poet Ovid, who was banished from Rome by the emperor Augustus, you may remember, to a remote place called Tomis on the shores of the Black Sea. There he died, ten years later, and his exile has gone into legend and int

      17 min read

    • Article

      Until The Sea Closed Over Us And The Light Was Gone

      Jul 1, 2020

      —Dante, Canto XXVI But if the truth is dreamed of toward the morning—El Paso Although it was really last summer’s song,all this summer Despacito played on as slower then I turned myself to gazeupon Juarez. The summer everything hurts my eyes, a dozen

      6 min read

    • Article

      Must-Read Poetry: September 2017

      Sep 11, 2017

      Isn’t that one of the purest goals of poetry—to justify our breaths? To recognize that we matter? The post Must-Read Poetry: September 2017 appeared first on The Millions.

      8 min read

    • Article

      After Kaddish

      Sep 27, 2018

      After Kaddish
      9 min read

    • Article

      Must-Read Poetry: November 2020

      Nov 5, 2020

      Stop obsessively refreshing the New York Times's elections page, and check out these new books of poetry by Alice Quinn, Margaret Atwood, Yi Lei, Karina Borowicz, Valzhyna Mort, and Paul Celan. The post Must-Read Poetry: November 2020 appeared first

      6 min read

    • Article

      Body Language

      Aug 14, 2019

      Body Language
      5 min read

    • Article

      Chinese Rhymes

      Mar 28, 2018

      Everybody who cares anything for old poetry in English knows how it feels—knows how awful it feels—when a poem is rhyming away and then suddenly the rhyme goes off the rails for a second because English pronunciation has changed since the time the po

      6 min read

    • Article

      Five Poems

      Nov 1, 2020

      The American linden sways nonplussed by the storm,a bounce here, a shimmy there, just shaking like musicleft over from the night’s end wafting into the avenues before sleep.I remember once walking down Clinton Street, and singingthat line returning,

      4 min read

    • Article

      Two Poems

      May 1, 2019

      Like the way Galway Kinnell fell asleep in 1968 in Athens, Ohio,reading from a wadded-up new poem pulled from his pocket,started too late at night the night before—the occasion, exactly, the Ohio Poetry Circuit,calling for, often, two readings a day,

      2 min read

    • Article

      Meet Your New Favorite Poet

      Feb 20, 2019

      Meet Your New Favorite Poet
      6 min read

    • Article

      Must-Read Poetry: July 2017

      Jul 24, 2017

      2017 is a banner year for poetry: debuts, new takes by established authors, and collections that span careers. The post Must-Read Poetry: July 2017 appeared first on The Millions.

      5 min read

    • Article

      Four Poems

      Mar 1, 2022

      I met the Bishop on the roadand much said he—same old porridgeI heard as a child, my little bodya “foul sty.” “Love has pitched his mansion.” MaybeLove pitched her silken tent.Love has raised its dwelling inthe place of reproduction, which can be fit

      3 min read

    • Article

      Stop Hating on Adjectives!

      Jun 12, 2019

      A common admonition in creative writing pedagogy is, “Cut as many adjectives as possible.” I propose that this rule springs from mere prejudice. The post Stop Hating on Adjectives! appeared first on The Millions.

      7 min read

    • Article

      In Search Of Nice Words

      Apr 10, 2024

      I DON’T know why we are here,’ admitted Wittgenstein, ‘but I’m pretty sure it is not in order to enjoy ourselves.’ Our twins, if their social-media posts since their arrival at university last September are anything to go by, think otherwise. Indeed,

      2 min read

    • Article

      Great Hymns Abide With Me

      Jan 10, 2024

      I was chatting to my Iranian fishmonger the other day about the oral tradition in poetry. His grandfather had lived in a small village, with no electricity or running water, and only dust roads. Being one of the only literate people in the community,

      3 min read

    • Article

      Must-Read Poetry: May 2019

      May 2, 2019

      Get a taste of six new collections, including the latest from Brooklyn's poet laureate Tina Chang. The post Must-Read Poetry: May 2019 appeared first on The Millions.

      6 min read

    Reviews for Personae

    4/5

    63 ratings2 reviews

    What did you think?

    Tap to rate

    Review must be at least 10 words

    • 3/5
      Pound is OK I guess.
    • 4/5
      As a catalog of Grandpa's early stuff, it's reliable. If interested in how he got to The Cantos, very fine. Could rely less on Pound's own discrimination and expand to include much of the shorter stuff. A lume Spento, A Quinzaine For This Yule, and later imagist stuff from BLAST,etc. Overall a solid representation of Pound's early efforts.

    Book preview

    Personae - Ezra Pound

    The Project Gutenberg EBook of Personae, by Ezra Pound

    This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with

    almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or

    re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included

    with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org

    Title: Personae

    Author: Ezra Pound

    Release Date: October 24, 2012 [EBook #41162]

    Language: English

    *** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PERSONAE ***

    Produced by Marc D'Hooghe at http://www.freeliterature.org

    (Images generously made available by the Internet Archive)

    PERSONAE

    OF

    EZRA POUND

    LONDON

    ELKIN MATHEWS, VIGO STREET

    MCMIX

    "Make-strong old dreams lest this our world lose heart."

    THIS BOOK IS FOR

    MARY MOORE

    OF TRENTON, IF SHE WANTS IT

    CONTENTS

    GRACE BEFORE SONG

    LA FRAISNE

    CINO

    NA AUDIART

    VILLONAUD FOR THIS YULE

    A VILLONAUD: BALLAD OF THE GIBBET

    MESMERISM

    FIFINE ANSWERS

    IN TEMPORE SENECTUTIS

    FAMAM LIBROSQUE CANO

    SCRIPTOR IGNOTUS

    PRAISE OF YSOLT

    CAMARADERIE

    MASKS

    TALLY-O

    BALLAD FOR GLOOM

    FOR E. Mc C

    AT THE HEART O' ME

    XENIA

    OCCIDIT

    SEARCH

    AN IDYL FOR GLAUCUS

    IN DURANCE

    GUILLAUME DE LORRIS BELATED

    IN THE OLD AGE OF THE SOUL

    ALBA BELINGALIS

    FROM SYRIA

    FROM THE SADDLE

    MARVOIL

    REVOLT

    AND THUS IN NINEVEH

    THE WHITE STAG

    PICCADILLY

    NOTES

    PERSONAE

    Grace before Song

    Lord God of heaven that with mercy dight

    Th' alternate prayer-wheel of the night and light

    Eternal hath to thee, and in whose sight

    Our days as rain drops in the sea surge fall,

    As bright white drops upon a leaden sea

    Grant so my songs to this grey folk may be:

    As drops that dream and gleam and falling catch the sun,

    Evan'scent mirrors every opal one

    Of such his splendour as their compass is,

    So, bold My Songs, seek ye such death as this.

    La Fraisne

    [1]

    SCENE: The Ash Wood of Malvern.

    For I was a gaunt, grave councillor

    Being in all things wise, and very old,

    But I have put aside this folly and the cold

    That old age weareth for a cloak.

    I was quite strong—at least they said so—

    The young men at the sword-play;

    But I have put aside this folly, being gay

    In another fashion that more suiteth me.

    I have curled mid the boles of the ash wood,

    I have hidden my face where the oak

    Spread his leaves over me, and the yoke

    Of the old ways of men have I cast aside.

    By the still pool of Mar-nan-otha

    Have I found me a bride

    That was a dog-wood tree some syne.

    She hath called me from mine old ways

    She hath hushed my rancour of council,

    Bidding me praise

    Naught but the wind that flutters in the leaves.

    She hath drawn me from mine old ways,

    Till men say that I am mad;

    But I have seen the sorrow of men, and am glad,

    For I know that the wailing and bitterness are a folly.

    And I? I have put aside all folly and all grief.

    I wrapped my tears in an ellum leaf

    And left them under a stone

    And now men call me mad because I have thrown

    All folly from me, putting it aside

    To leave the old barren ways of men,

    Because my bride

    Is a pool of the wood, and

    Though all men say that I am mad

    It is only that I am glad,

    Very glad, for my bride hath toward me a great love

    That is sweeter than the love of women

    That plague and burn and drive one away.

    Aie-e! 'Tis true that I am gay

    Quite gay, for I have her alone here

    And no

    Enjoying the preview?
    Page 1 of 1