Saturday, April 24, 2010

Magnificent Asparagus Fountain

The care with which the rain is
wrong and the green is wrong and
the white is wrong, the care with
which there is a chair and
plenty of breathing.  The care with
which there is incredible justice
and likeness, all this makes
a magnificent asparagus, and
also a fountain.

---Gertrude Stein, Tender Buttons (1914)

To be brief, Stein's off-beat allusion to material objects, weather, colors, foods, bodily functions, and domestic work in this ground-breaking collection of poetry conveys the excitement and pleasure of possession in its deepest and most intangible sense. Vitality! 

[Side note:  observe Stein's use of the word care.  See also this entry, HERE]

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