"i shall imagine life
is not worth dying, if
(and when) roses complain
their beauties are in vain
but though mankind persuades
itself that every weed's
a rose, roses (you feel
certain) will only smile”
E.E. Cummings, “i shall imagine life”
I once reviewed a poem for a high school
literary magazine that included the line “not vain/ Like a flower.” I mistook
the author’s meaning, or at least her punctuation, to imply that flowers are
vain. Which of course they are. What other purpose is the color and the beauty
except to call attention to itself: the very definition of vain.
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