Juniper

On November 8, 2003, Professor Dara Wier and her MFA Form & Theory Seminar from the Juniper Initiative of the University of Massachusetts-Amherst visited the Ashbery Resource Center (ARC) and toured John Ashbery's home in Hudson, NY. Their visit was part of a semester-long investigation into the concept of the poet's persona, particularly as that is defined by a poet's first book. Among other poets' works, the seminar examined Ashbery's first major poetry collection, Some Trees (Yale U.P., 1956). They also read Other Traditions (Harvard U.P., 2000), a collection of essays based on the Norton Lectures that Ashbery delivered at Harvard University, in which he spoke about six "minor" poets who have special significance for him and his work.

In addition to the importance of these texts to understanding Ashbery's work and persona, the Flow Chart Foundation (FCF) suggested to the students that they also consider the physical environment of Ashbery's home, a space he has chosen, populated, and arranged, a space that both shapes and mirrors the poems written within it. The restoration and furnishing of the late-nineteenth-century house has been a twenty-five-year process during which Ashbery has been intimately involved with every detail of the interior design, choosing the rugs and wallpaper that permanently frame the space, and amassing and periodically rotating collections of paintings, statuary and memorabilia including toys and games, kitsch, and objects from or reminiscent of Ashbery's childhood. FCF President David Kermani conducted a tour of this living museum, pointing out the frequency with which Ashbery has identified his poems' Cageian susceptibility to the events (sights, sounds, tastes) that occur while the poems are in the process of emerging. Kermani and the Juniper students were able to identify objects in the home that corresponded to references in Ashbery's poems; as well as arrangements of objects reminiscent of linguistic arrangements in the work. The parallel between the poetic and domestic environments was particularly striking in the juxtaposition of fine artworks with the artifacts of popular culture. The same relationship was evidenced in the juxtaposition of personal memorabilia, objects of private memory, with mass-produced objects, artifacts of the universal. The students and ARC/FCF representatives found a medley of values—personal/biographical, fine/aesthetic, kitsch/camp—simultaneously present in both the domestic and the poetic spaces engineered by Ashbery. (For an elaboration of this relationship between Ashbery's domestic and poetic spaces, please visit the Ashbery’s Created Spaces page.)

Following the tour of Ashbery's home, Professor Wier and her students visited the ARC archive. There, they examined original archival materials and discussed their pertinence to the concept of poetic persona. Particular attention was paid to Some Trees and Other Traditions. The group discussed the irony of the austerity of the Yale University Press edition of Some Trees, and the mainstreaming effect that the character of that publishing house and the weight of the W.H. Auden introduction (however reluctantly written) had on these poems, despite the fact that the work had issued directly from a hothouse, avant-garde arts environment. This irony has continued throughout Ashbery's career, as his relentlessly experimental work has regularly been published by such generally traditional houses as Wesleyan University Press, Dutton, Viking, Knopf, Penguin, and so on. ARC Managing Director Micaela Morrissette suggested that the reputations of these houses and the glossy editions that they issue might affect readers' understandings of the work, lessen the shock of its experimentalism, and render the Ashberian persona more user-friendly or commercial. The students were also asked to consider whether Ashbery might have deliberately worked against that in Other Traditions, by selecting obscure writers and critiquing their work in a markedly unacademic and personal tone. Could Other Traditions, despite its publisher, have represented Ashbery's attempt to reclaim a renegade persona from the academic mainstream by identifying himself with writers on the very outskirts of the canon? The opposite possibility was also considered: that by adopting the role of critic and judge and by articulating his connection to the past, Ashbery could be settling into a conservative persona.

To facilitate discussion of these and related ideas, the ARC provided the seminar with materials including a log of revisions made over the years to the poems in Some Trees (scroll all the way down this page to see the log), as well as the editorial correspondence that shaped the evolution of Other Traditions. Additionally, the ARC made available a number of archival items from other categories of interest not related directly to these two works, which could contribute to the students' discussion of persona in new or unexpected ways. Below is an inventory of the items examined by the Form & Theory students. You may click on each item to read a brief summary of the discussion that centered around it.

The ARC's intention in providing these summaries of discussion is not to support any given interpretation of the materials. Rather, we want to illustrate the multiplicity of diverse theses to which a single text or object can pertain. In particular, we wish to document the ways in which the items were applied to one specific pedagogical context, the Juniper seminar's visit to the archive. We hope that educators and students will use these preliminary notes in their own classrooms for their own purposes. In keeping with the tone of our discussion—which was informal, ranged widely from topic to topic, and concentrated on raising questions rather than providing answers—these notes are rough sketches of what were frequently unfinished arguments, avenues of inquiry not (yet) fully explored.

Poetry, 1945 November
(periodical containing the first publication of a poem by Ashbery, plagiarized by a Deerfield Academy classmate and published by him under a pseudonym)

We discussed the irony (and even the prophecy!) implicit in the fact that the plagiarism of this first publication imposed on the poem layers of fiction, disassociation of meaning, and confusion of identity: descriptions that apply to Ashbery's poetry throughout his career.

Nomad New York, 1962 Autumn
(periodical containing John Bernard Myers' essay "In Regards to this Selection of Verse, or Every Painter Should Have His Poet," in which Myers discusses the New York Schools of painting and poetry; note that this is not the notorious Nomad essay of 1961 in which Myers actually coined the term "New York School" for the first time)

We discussed Ashbery's consistent objections to the term "New York School" as applied to his work and proposed various interpretations of his dislike of the label. For example, a link between his poetry and coterie might imply a misleading degree of importance with regard to the influence of autobiography on his work. Alternately or additionally, if experimentalism is related to individualism, then identification with a particular group implies a limit to innovation. Ashbery has generally cared most for poets whose work cannot be easily assimilated within a school, movement, or aesthetic, such as the poets of Other Traditions. He has typically expressed disdain for groups such as the Surrealists, and perplexity regarding his own influence on groups such as the Language poets.

Turandot
(students viewed a copy containing a holographic correction by Ashbery, as well as a paste-up; this fine art edition, published by the Tibor de Nagy Gallery in 1953, includes many of the poems that subsequently appeared in Some Trees, as well as poems never again published)

We discussed the way in which the book-as-object may influence a reader's understanding of the poems therein. We raised the possibility that someone who first encountered "Some Trees" in the Tibor de Nagy Gallery's Turandot would be more likely to see its experimental, avant-garde qualities, while someone who first encountered it in Yale University Press's Some Trees might be prone to understand it as a more conventional love poem. We also discussed Ashbery's refusal to allow certain of the poems in Turandot to be reprinted. Could Ashbery's disinterest in the academic value of these early works, regardless of their perceived limitations, indicate indifference or hostility to the persona the academic reader may create from them? Might he feel that the poems' failings—the distance between what he hoped to achieve in them and what he did achieve—yields an inaccurate understanding of persona? Might others feel, conversely, that precisely because these poems are early, unsuccessful, accidental, unstudied in parts, that they are particularly valuable indicators of a persona that might otherwise hide behind the illusionism of more polished poems? Does Ashbery's desire to protect the poems from public scrutiny mean that they offer a more intimate and honest glimpse into the private persona? Or are "bad" poems also bad indicators of the persona of the poet?

Poetry, 1955 December
(periodical containing the poems "And You Know," "Grand Abacus," "The Pied Piper," and "The Painter," all subsequently published in Some Trees)

We discussed revisions that occur between periodical and book publication, and how tracking revisions can allow readers to deduce an aesthetic by examining the choices that the poet is seen to have made. We also asked how the periodicals to which Ashbery chooses to submit his work might give insight into the context in which he wishes to be read, the scene or style with which he wishes to be affiliated, the company he prefers to keep. We examined the implications of the fact that now, when Ashbery's choice of forums for his work is greatest, he frequently publishes in mainstream journals. Can the financial benefits of publication in more established journals adequately explain that choice? Could the desire for a larger audience, the potential for wider communication, be at the root of the decision? Could the quality of the other work in the journal be a factor? In general, can Ashbery's choice to present his poetry in relatively mainstream forums be identified as an attempt at controlling persona through context, or does it seem that pragmatism is the ruling determinant?

Poetry New York, 1950
(periodical containing the poems "The Dolors of Colombine" and "The Statues," which were not published in Some Trees)

We discussed the value of comparing poems included in a book with poems from the same period that the author excluded from the book. We considered whether rejected poems might tell readers as much about a poet's aesthetic as revisions to poems, whether we might be able to successfully deduce which particular element in a rejected poem prejudiced the poet against it.

This, 1973
(periodical containing an interview with poet Clark Coolidge, conducted by Susan Coolidge and Barrett Watten, in which Clark Coolidge discusses works by Ashbery including Some Trees, The Tennis Court Oath and Three Poems)

We discussed the relationship of this interview to Other Traditions, and the value of a poet's analysis of poetry versus a critic's analysis. We remarked on the common hostility to critics, and asked whether that hostility is absent or less in the case of critics who are also (or primarily) poets. We argued whether or not, despite Ashbery's contention that financial reasons convinced him to deliver the Norton Lectures (published in Other Traditions), he might have done so in part in order to reclaim poetics from academic criticism. Coolidge in his interview, like Ashbery in Other Traditions, intertwines formal and personal reactions in his discussion of poetics. We asked whether, in Other Traditions, a poetic persona with intuitive, emotional reactions, could be said to have won out over a critical persona with academic, formal reactions.

Harvard Advocate, 1948 November
(cover art for this periodical is a collaborative collage by Ashbery and his Harvard classmate Frederick Amory)

We discussed collage with regard to Ashbery's work. We identified collaged language, such as in Ashbery's poem "Europe" (The Tennis Court Oath). Another collage by Ashbery, "L'Heure Exquise," was also examined, and collages by other artists—both visual and linguistic—, created in response to Ashbery's work, were passed around.

Drawings of Ashbery from his Harvard period, possibly self-portraits

We discussed Ashbery's shift in interest from a career as a visual artist to one as a poet, pointing out that the shift took place around the same time that he wrote the poem "The Painter" (Some Trees). We asked to what degree it could be fruitful to make comparisons between Ashbery's visual and poetic compositions, in the same way that earlier in the day we had made comparisons between his creation of poetic and domestic spaces. We examined the importance of the visual arts, particularly Abstract Expressionism, to Ashbery's work. We also noted Ashbery's repeated insistence that such a connection is tenuous at best, despite critics' tenacious attention to the idea, and despite his long career as an art critic and ambitions to be a painter.

Locus Solus, 1962 Winter
(periodical edited by Ashbery)

We discussed the possibility of interpreting works edited by Ashbery as gauges of his personal aesthetic. Like Other Traditions, periodicals and books edited by Ashbery generally suggest a predilection for the undervalued and experimental. However, like Other Traditions, this editorial association with the avant-garde is often presented in a mainstream context. While Locus Solus was indisputably a small-press periodical, Ashbery has also served as editor for the Partisan Review, as well as for the yearly anthology The Best American Poetry, both of which reach a comparatively large audience and are not markedly experimental. Students also examined the Autumn 1964 issue of Kulchur, containing Ted Berrigan's review of Art and Literature, in which Berrigan writes specifically about Ashbery's editorial contribution to that periodical.

Material written while employed at Oxford University Press
(jacket copy, press releases, and poetry and prose for Oxford U.P.'s house organ, One Fourteen)

We discussed the deromanticization of the poet's persona. We examined these materials produced by Ashbery as a writer-for-hire, but were unsuccessful in our attempt to discover productive links between the commercial texts and Ashbery's poetry or even his critical prose.

Semi-Colon, 1955 [?]
(periodical containing Ashbery's translation of Max Jacob's prose poem "Literature and Poetry")

We discussed the deductions that could be drawn about Ashbery's aesthetic and persona by comparing his choices as the translator of a given text versus the choices of another translator. We also discussed the deductions that could be drawn based on the works and authors he has chosen to translate. We hypothesized about the possibility of examining different translators' renderings of a given poem by Ashbery and asked whether the variations between their translations might bring to light the variant linguistic and emotional nuances inherent in his original version.

Murder in Montmartre, [1960]
(by Noel Vexin, translated by Ashbery and Lawrence G. Blochman)

We discussed Blochman's revision, at the American publisher's request, of Ashbery's original translation, and talked about Blochman's quip that while most translators tend to have trouble with the language they were translating from, in Ashbery's case he seemed not to know how to write English. We were also interested that the publisher asked Ashbery to "sex up" the French original and add new erotic passages. We debated the possible value of identifying and analyzing those sections.

Miscellaneous works by other artists, influenced by Ashbery's poetry
(numerous examples including poems, novels, musical compositions, plays, films, visual artworks, architectural structures, etc.)

We discussed how such works, whether influenced by Ashbery's writing in general or based on a particular poem by Ashbery, not only illustrate the artist's understanding of Ashbery's aesthetic and persona, but can filter and shape a third party's understanding of Ashbery's work. For example, someone who has heard Elliott Carter's musical setting of Ashbery's "Syringa" may always be conscious of the Orpheus myth within the poem, because of Carter's use of the corresponding Greek texts in his composition. Due to that person's familiarity with Carter's work, he or she may be predominantly aware of the reimagining of ancient themes and the interweaving of classical and modern tropes that takes place throughout Ashbery's poetry. On the other hand, someone exposed to Ashbery's poem "Untilted" by way of Rudy Burckhardt's film "Untitled" may be drawn to consider Ashbery's work as a whole in light of its relationship to cinema. Such a person may concentrate primarily on technique, recognizing Ashbery's use of flashback, fade-in, zoom, cut, black-out, etc., and may conceive of Ashbery as a poet of shifts and interstices.

Violin Concerto
(by Robin Holloway, 1987-1990; this composition, to compensate for Holloway's failure to set any of Ashbery's poems, "sets" the Tiffany-style windows in Ashbery's home instead, together with Rilke's poem cycle "Les fenetres")

We discussed the fact that Holloway's concerto, while it evolves from an understanding of the whole of Ashbery's poetry, also recognizes that the poet's persona encompasses not only the written word, but physical existence, domestic, daily life. The concerto, sketched out at the piano in Ashbery's music room, interprets Ashbery's environment, which surrounds Holloway as he plays; it also reinterprets that environment for Ashbery himself, who acknowledges listening to Holloway's composition frequently. By giving Ashbery a new understanding of his own domestic environment, the poems that Ashbery composes within that environment may themselves change. Thus, the influence is cyclical—the poetry which impelled Holloway to write his composition may alter in response to the concerto that responds to it.

Miscellaneous source material for Ashbery's poetry; influences on Ashbery's work (numerous examples including poems, novels, musical compositions, plays, films, visual artworks, architectural structures, etc.)

We discussed the primacy of language in Ashbery's source material. While Ashbery openly draws from both the techniques and the products of every art form, he frequently borrows, for example, not the musical structure of an opera, but the title of one of its arias ("And the Stars Were Shining," from Puccini's Tosca). He may appropriate not the slow-motion technique of a particular film, but rather the name of one of the actors or characters in it. We also mentioned the danger of deducing too much about Ashbery's personal tastes from his manipulation of source material. He has on several occasions made use of works he had never seen or heard. He has also stated that, while he believes music is the art form most important to his poetry, while he enjoys the work of challenging contemporary composers such as Gubaidulina, Cage, and Carter, and while he almost always listens to music while writing poetry, he nonetheless feels some of his best work is accomplished while listening to classical music of the "trashy French" variety. We imagined the value of identifying two poems written while Ashbery was listening to two different musical works and comparing the influences of the music on the poems; or, identifying two poems written while Ashbery was listening to the same musical work and comparing the influence of that piece on each poem. We also postulated about the patterns of similarities and dissimilarities that could be found if tracing a sequence from Ashbery's influences to works influences by him. For example, we suggested comparing a musical work that inspired a poem by Ashbery to a musical work based on that poem, or contrasting a painting incorporated within a poem by Ashbery with a painting based on that poem. To what extent might the musical compositions or the paintings speak directly to each other, and to what extent must the parallels between them depend on the intervening agent of the poem? We identified various technical devices from music, film, theater, painting and architecture that Ashbery employs in his poetry.

Miscellaneous anthologies containing reprints of poems in Some Trees

We discussed the context that anthologies provide for the poems they contain, and the ways in which an anthology may reinforce a dominant assumption about poem (by including "The Painter" in an anthology of poems about the visual arts) or may add a new layer of meaning to a poem (by including "Thoughts of a Young Girl" in an anthology of poems about mothers and daughters). We identified the most frequently anthologized of Ashbery's poems, and we also noted that editors' preferences for certain poems for inclusion in anthologies changes over time. We supposed that this could be due either to shifting expectations of what a poem should be or to shifting perceptions of who the poet is, as many anthologies attempt to reprint poems that encapsulate the poet's persona or that are most representative of the poet's style.

Miscellaneous audio and video recordings of Ashbery reading poems in Some Trees

We discussed the idea that hearing Ashbery's vocalization of a poem can alter perceptions of both the poem and the poet's persona. We also discussed the value of listening to the same poem read several times over the course of many years, and hearing Ashbery's reading of the poem change as the relationship between the words and the poet changes.

Miscellaneous interviews with Ashbery in which he discusses Some Trees and Other Traditions

We discussed the control of the interviewer over the poet's attempt to shape his own persona, and we noted the importance of the post-interview editorial process in allowing the poet to reclaim the persona to some extent. We compared the relative influence of interviews, written autobiographical statements, book reviews, critical essays and the poetry itself over a reader's conception of the poet's persona. We asked whether interviews might often rise in this hierarchy because of the perception that they offer spontaneous, unguarded information about the real poet, the poet who is behind the poems, rather than the poet who is the poems. We wondered whether interviews or poetry are more powerful in shaping the public's understanding of the poet's private self.

Miscellaneous reviews of and critical essays about Some Trees and Other Traditions

We discussed the competition of media voices both with each other and with the original work.

Log of revisions to poems in Some Trees in various book and periodical publications

(The Yale University Press edition of Some Trees has been used as the standard: each publication has been compared against it.)

(This list of revisions does not take account of variations between British and American English in punctuation and spelling.)

(It is quite possible that some of these revisions were not Ashbery's suggestions but either errors or decisions of the publisher.)

(Considerable care has been taken in comparing the Yale edition of Some Trees with Turandot, New World Writing, Contemporary American Poetry, Selected Poems [Cape], Some Trees [Corinth], Penguin Modern Poets and Some Trees [Ecco]. Considerably less care has been taken in comparing the Yale edition of Some Trees with Selected Poems [Penguin, Paladin, Carcanet, Eurographica] and The Mooring of Starting Out [Ecco, Carcanet], on the [perhaps erroneous] assumption that revisions were unlikely to have been made at such late dates.)

***

"Popular Songs"

line 3 of stanza 2
Turandot (1953)—"Rises nightly to exasperated stands"
Some Trees (1956, Yale)—"Rises nightly to disappointed stands"

***

"Poem "

line 1 of stanza 4
Some Trees (1956, Yale)—"A room of people waiting"
Some Trees (1970, Corinth; 1978, Ecco) (and all subsequent publications)—"A roomful of people waiting"

***

"Pantoum"
line 1 of stanza 3
Some Trees (1956, Yale)—"The usual obtuse blanket"
Some Trees (1970, Corinth; 1978, Ecco)—"The usual obtuse blanket?"
[reverts to the Yale U.P. version in The Mooring of Starting Out]

***

"The Mythological Poet"

line 4 of Part I
Turandot (1953)—"Of sensation, as if a fixed delight"
Some Trees (1956, Yale)—"Of sensation, as if pleasure"

line 7 of Part II
Turandot (1953)—seventh line is not followed by stanza break
Some Trees (1956, Yale)—seventh line is followed by stanza break

***

"The Orioles"

line 1 of stanza 2
Some Trees (1956, Yale)—"The old house guards its memories; the birds"
Some Trees (1970, Corinth; 1978, Ecco) (and all subsequent publications)—"The old house guards its memories, the birds"

line 3 of stanza 8
Some Trees (1956, Yale)—"And even when they wing against the trees in bright formation"
Some Trees (1970, Corinth; 1978, Ecco) (and all subsequent publications)—"And even when they
fly against the trees in bright formation"

***

"Errors"

line 13
Folder (1953 Winter [i.e. October])—"The moon tears up, scoffing at unrinsed portions."
Some Trees (1956, Yale)—"The moon now tears up, scoffing at the unrinsed portions."

***

"Illustration"

line 16 of Part II
Turandot (1953)—"Of indifference, or a miracle"
Some Trees (1956, Yale)—"Of indifference, a miracle"

***

"Some Trees"

line 1 of stanza 1
Harvard Advocate (1949 March 31)—"These are amazing; each"
Some Trees (1956, Yale)—"These are amazing: each"

line 2 of stanza 1
Harvard Advocate (1949 March 31), Turandot (1953)—"Joining a neighbor, as if speech"
Some Trees (1956, Yale)—"Joining a neighbor, as though speech"

line 1 of stanza 2
Harvard Advocate (1949 March 31)—"To meet as far, this morning"
Some Trees (1956, Yale)—"To meet as far this morning"

line 1 of stanza 3
Harvard Advocate (1949 March 31), Turandot (1953)—"To tell us we are;"
Some Trees (1956, Yale)—"To tell us we are:"

line 2 of stanza 3
Harvard Advocate (1949 March 31)—"That our merely being here"
Some Trees (1956, Yale)—"That their merely being there"

line 1 of stanza 5
Harvard Advocate (1949 March 31)—"A gathering of smiles, a summer morning."
Turandot (1953)—"A gathering of smiles, a winter morning."
Some Trees (1956, Yale)—"A chorus of smiles, a winter morning."

line 3 of stanza 5
Harvard Advocate (1949 March 31), Turandot (1953)—"Our days put on such reticence,"
Some Trees (1956, Yale)—"Our days put on such reticence"

***

"Hotel Dauphin"

line 3 of stanza 4
Quarterly Review of Literature (1955)—"Fortunately, the snow, cutting like a knife"
Some Trees (1956, Yale)—"Fortunately, the snow, cutting like a knife,"

***

"The Painter"

line 3 of stanza 7 (last line)
Some Trees (1956, Yale)—"As if his subject had decided to remain a prayer"
Some Trees (1970, Corinth; 1978, Ecco) (and all subsequent publications)—"As though his subject had decided to remain a prayer"

***

"And You Know"

line 15 of stanza 1
Some Trees (1956, Yale)—"In my home come to me anxiously at night, asking how it goes."
Selected Poems (1967, Cape)—"In my home come to me anxiously at night, asking how it goes:"

***

"He"

line 1 of stanza 1
Turandot (1953), New World Writing (1953)—"He cuts down the lakes so they appear straight."
Some Trees (1956, Yale)—"He cuts down the lakes so they appear straight"

line 1 of stanza 4
Some Trees (1956, Yale)—"'He is the liar behind the hedge"
New World Writing (1953)—"'He is the liar behind the hedge."

line 3 of stanza 3
Turandot (1953)—"He writes to say, 'If ever you visit this island"
Some Trees (1956, Yale)—"He writes to say, 'If ever you visit this island,"

line 4 of stanza 8
Some Trees (1956, Yale)—"He helps his mother take in the clothes-line."
New World Writing (1953)—"He helps his mother take in the clothesline."

line 2 of stanza 9
Some Trees (1956, Yale)—"He is known as 'Liverlips.'"
New World Writing (1953)—"He is known as Liverlips."

line 1 of stanza 12
Some Trees (1956, Yale)—"'He prevented the murder of Mistinguett in Mexico."
New World Writing (1953)—"'He prevented the murder of Mistinguette in Mexico."

***

"Meditations of a Parrot"

line 2 of stanza 1
Turandot (1953)—"The oasis and the paraphrase"
Some Trees (1956, Yale)—"The oasis and the bed"

line 3 of stanza 5 (last line)
Some Trees (1956, Yale)—"And all day: Robin Hood! Robin Hood!)"
Some Trees (1970, Corinth; 1978, Ecco)—"And all day! Robin Hood! Robin Hood!)"
[reverts to the Yale U.P. version in The Mooring of Starting Out]

***

"The Way They Took"

line 4 of stanza 1
Folder (1953 Winter [i.e. October])—"We hedged about leisure, feeling walking"
Some Trees (1956, Yale)—"We hedged about leisure, feeling, walking"

line 8 of stanza 1
Folder (1953 Winter [i.e. October])—"He saw the look of some other people,"
Some Trees (1956, Yale)—"You saw the look of some other people,"

line 9 of stanza 1
Folder (1953 Winter [i.e. October])—"Huge husks of chattering boys,"
Some Trees (1956, Yale)—"Huge husks of chattering boys"

line 10 of stanza 1
Folder (1953 Winter [i.e. October])—"Girls unfathomable in lovely dresses"
Some Trees (1956, Yale)—"And girls unfathomable in lovely dresses"

line 2 of stanza 2
Folder (1953 Winter [i.e. October])—"To what was on my shoulder. One day"
Some Trees (1956, Yale)—"To what was on my shoulder. One day you were lunching"

line 3 of stanza 2
Folder (1953 Winter [i.e. October])—"You were ruminating with a friend's mother,"
Some Trees (1956, Yale)—"With a friend's mother; I thought how plebeian all this testimony,"

line 1 of stanza 3
Folder (1953 Winter [i.e. October])—"But I know how romantic, how they whispered"
Some Trees (1956, Yale)—"But I know now how romantic, how they whispered"

line 2 of stanza 3
Folder (1953 Winter [i.e. October])—"Under the lace of their aspiring"
Some Trees (1956, Yale)—"Behind the lace of their aspiring"

***

"A Pastoral"

line 1 of stanza 3
Folder (1954 [April?])—"The next day, finding him less handsome,"
Some Trees (1956, Yale)—"Tomorrow, finding him less handsome,"
Some Trees (1970, Corinth; 1978, Ecco) (and all subsequent publications)—"Tomorrow, finding them less handsome,"

line 2 of stanza 3
Folder (1954 [April?])—"They side with the foreseeing of animals."
Some Trees (1956, Yale)—"They might side with the foreseeing of animals."

line 4 of stanza 3
Folder (1954 [April?])—"Begin to flow, teaching the showboat"
Some Trees (1956, Yale)—"Would start, teaching the showboat"

line 6 of stanza 3
Folder (1954 [April?])—"What flowers to press back into shade."
Some Trees (1956, Yale)—"Which flowers to press back into the shade."

line 2 of stanza 4
Folder (1954 [April?])—"My mouse-colored head shall mobilize that handsome"
Some Trees (1956, Yale)—"Myself shall mobilize that handsome"

line 3 of stanza 6
Some Trees (1956, Yale)—"That cleave to the heart before it learns what animals"
Some Trees (1970, Corinth; 1978, Ecco) (and all subsequent publications)—"That cleave to the heart before it learns the animals"