'The news that stays'

 

“If a nation's literature declines, the nation atrophies and decays. Literature is news that stays news.” – Ezra Pound

 

Born in New York City on Oct. 30, 1885 Pound spent most of his adult life in Great Britain and is considered the poet most responsible for defining and promoting the so-called “modernist poetry movement.”  He also is noted for opening an exchange of work and ideas between British and American writers and for his support of writers like W.B. Yeats, Robert Frost, Marianne Moore, William Hemingway and T.S. Elliot.

 

 “Good writers,” he said, “are those who keep the language efficient . . . accurate . . . . (and) clear.”  For Saturday’s Poem, here is Pound’s,

 

The Sea of Glass

I looked and saw a sea
                               roofed over with rainbows,
In the midst of each
                               two lovers met and departed;
Then the sky was full of faces
                               with gold glories behind them.