STEVIE SMITH ~

 

SPOKEN ~

Stevie Smith

Florence Margaret Smith, known as "Stevie Smith" (20 September 1902 – 7 March 1971) was an English poet and novelist. Born in Kingston upon Hull, was the second daughter of Ethel and Charles Smith. She was called "Peggy" within her family, but acquired the name "Stevie" as a young woman when she was riding in the park with a friend who said that she reminded him of the jockey Steve Donaghue.

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Not Waving but Drowning



Nobody heard him, the dead man,  
But still he lay moaning:
I was much further out than you thought  
And not waving but drowning.

Poor chap, he always loved larking
And now he’s dead
It must have been too cold for him his heart gave way,  
They said.

Oh, no no no, it was too cold always  
(Still the dead one lay moaning)  
I was much too far out all my life  
And not waving but drowning.


~ Stevie Smith
New Selected Poems 

(New Directions Publishing Corporation, 1988) 

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Novels ~

    Novel on Yellow Paper (Cape, 1936)
    Over the Frontier (Cape 1938)
    The Holiday (Chapman and Hall, 1949)

Poetry ~

    This Englishwoman (1937)
    A Good Time Was Had By All (Cape, 1937)
    Tender Only to One (Cape, 1938)
    Mother, What Is Man? (Cape, 1942)
    Harold's Leap (Cape, 1950)
    Not Waving but Drowning (Deutsch, 1957)
    Selected Poems (Longmans, 1962) includes 17 previously unpublished poems
    The Frog Prince (Longmans, 1966) includes 69 previously unpublished poems
    The Best Beast (Longmans, 1969)
    Two in One (Longmans, 1971) reprint of Selected Poems and The Frog Prince
    Scorpion and Other Poems (Longmans, 1972)
    Collected Poems (Allen Lane, 1975)
    Selected Poems (Penguin, 1978)
    New Selected Poems of Stevie Smith (New Directions, 1988)

Also ~

    Some Are More Human Than Others: A Sketch-Book (Gaberbocchus, 1958)
    Me Again: Uncollected Writings of Stevie Smith (Virago, 1984)
    "The Necessity of Not Believing" (Gemini No. 5, Spring 1958, Vol. 2, No. 1)

LOOK WHO HAS COME FOR A VISIT. . .

THE PLEASURE OF

FRIENDSHIP

The pleasures of friendship are exquisite.

How pleasant to go to a friend on a visit!

I go to my friend, we walk on the grass,

And the hours and minutes like moments pass.

Stevie Smith

MY HEART WAS FULL

My heart was full of softening showers,

I used to swing like this for hours,

I did not care for war or death,

I was glad to draw my breath.

WE REAL COOL

(The Pool Players.

Seven at the Golden Shovel.)

We real cool. We

Left school. We

Lurk late. We

strike straight. We

Sing sin. We

Thin gin. We

Jazz June. We

Die soon.

Gwendolyn Brooks

LOVE POEM

---It's so nice

to wake up in the morning

---all alone

and not have to tell somebody

---you love them

when you don't love them

---any more.

Richard Brautigan

I'm no fan of the set-up, the pre-arranged, the presentation, though I have arranged this morning these treats out on the porch sun steps, and they all came to me over the last few months. Just found.

The Stevie Smith is a real treat of actually being available; the Gwendolyn Brooks for all time; and the Brautigan so reasonably priced and just hanging out. I like how he is handing us the phone. A time and place.

Make sure you have your reading glasses and magnifying glass handy to read the Brautigan CD booklet notes: Michael McClure and Bruce Conner are here reading or contributing in some fashion, along with other friends and visitors. The Stevie Smith has a whalloping 50 poems starting with "My Cats". The Gwendolyn Brooks is one hour long, and gives us longer poems "The Lovers of the Poor" and "The Sundays of Satin-Legs Smith" along with her other great stuff.

If I was asked to bring in recordings of modern poets to folks wanting to hear a poem, I'd bring in these three. There would be no question-mark faces. Everyone would recognize something of their own lives here. I'm pretty sure they'd ask for more.