John Ashbery
John Ashbery
John Lawrence Ashberyis an American poet. He has published more than twenty volumes of poetry and won nearly every major American award for poetry, including a Pulitzer Prize in 1976 for his collection Self-Portrait in a Convex Mirror. Renowned for its postmodern complexity and opacity, Ashbery's work still proves controversial. Ashbery has stated that he wishes his work to be accessible to as many people as possible, and not to be a private dialogue with himself. At the same time,...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionPoet
Date of Birth28 July 1927
CountryUnited States of America
Things can harden meaningfully in the moment of indecision
Death is a new office building filled with modern furniture, A wise thing, but which has no purpose for us.
In the evening Everything has a schedule, if you can find out what it is.
I like poems you can tack all over with a hammer and there are no hollow places.
Life is not at all what you might think it to be A simple tale where each thing has its history It's much more than its scuffle and anything goes Both evil and good, subject to the same laws.
Life is beautiful. He who reads that As in the window of some distant, speeding train Knows what he wants, and what will befall.
The gray glaze of the past attacks all know-how....
To the poet as a basement quilt, but perhaps To some reader a latticework of regrets ...
The sun fades like the spreading Of a peacock's tail, as though twilight Might be read as a warning to those desperate For easy solutions.
Will occur as time grows more open about it.
The mind Is so hospitable, taking in everything Like boarders, and you don't see until It's all over how little there was to learn Once the stench of knowledge has dissipated.
A perfect example of the new republic's urge to drape itself with the togas of classical respectability.
I lost my ridiculous accent without acquiring another
Each servant stamps the reader with a look.