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    The Tree of Life: 'I knew all the sorrows of the world''
    The Tree of Life: 'I knew all the sorrows of the world''
    The Tree of Life: 'I knew all the sorrows of the world''
    Ebook97 pages1 hour

    The Tree of Life: 'I knew all the sorrows of the world''

    By John Gould Fletcher

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    About this ebook

    John Gould Fletcher was born in Little Rock, Arkansas on 3rd January 1886 to a socially prominent family.

    He was educated at Phillips Academy, Andover before advancing to Harvard University which he attended from 1903 to 1907, before dropping out after his father's death.

    As a young man Fletcher spent many years in England where he became part of the influential Imagist group of poets together with Amy Lowell and Ezra Pound.

    His first marriage came from a resumed relationship with the now married Florence Emily ‘Daisy’ Arbuthnot. Her adultery with Fletcher was the grounds for her divorce from Malcolm Arbuthnot. They married on 5th July 1916 but later divorced.

    Fletcher first published in 1912, with ‘The Dominant City’ too much praise and admiration and followed this with other well-regarded volumes such as ‘Irradiations: Sand and Spray’, and ‘Goblins and Pagodas’.

    In the late 1920s and 1930s Fletcher became increasingly active with a group of Southern writers and poets known as the Southern Agrarians. They published the classic ‘I'll Take My Stand: The South and the Agrarian Tradition’.

    Although he was highly regarded as a poet he was not very prolific. However, such was the undoubted quality that in 1939 he received the Pulitzer Prize for his work ‘Selected Poems’. He was the first poet from the south to receive such an accolade. Fletcher’s other passion and pursuit was as an authority on modern painting, a subject on which he also published.

    A second marriage followed in 1936 to the children’s author, Charlie May Simon. They built ‘Johnswood’, a residence on the bluffs of the Arkansas River and travelled frequently to New York for shots of modern culture and intellectual stimulation as well as to the American West and South for the climate after Fletcher developed chronic arthritis.

    In 1937 he wrote his autobiography, ‘Life is My Song’.

    His developing passion for his roots and background resulted in the writing of a history of his State and published in 1947; ‘Arkansas’.

    By now Fletcher was suffering from bouts of depression and on 10th May 1950, he committed suicide by drowning himself in a pond near his home in Little Rock, Arkansas.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherPortable Poetry
    Release dateFeb 1, 2021
    ISBN9781839677472
    The Tree of Life: 'I knew all the sorrows of the world''

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      Book preview

      The Tree of Life - John Gould Fletcher

      The Tree of Life by John Gould Fletcher

      To MY WIFE

      John Gould Fletcher was born in Little Rock, Arkansas on 3rd January 1886 to a socially prominent family.

      He was educated at Phillips Academy, Andover before advancing to Harvard University which he attended from 1903 to 1907, before dropping out after his father's death.

      As a young man Fletcher spent many years in England where he became part of the influential Imagist group of poets together with Amy Lowell and Ezra Pound. 

      His first marriage came from a resumed relationship with the now married Florence Emily ‘Daisy’ Arbuthnot. Her adultery with Fletcher was the grounds for her divorce from Malcolm Arbuthnot.  They married on 5th July 1916 but later divorced.

      Fletcher first published in 1912, with ‘The Dominant City’ too much praise and admiration and followed this with other well-regarded volumes such as ‘Irradiations: Sand and Spray’, and ‘Goblins and Pagodas’.

      In the late 1920s and 1930s Fletcher became increasingly active with a group of Southern writers and poets known as the Southern Agrarians. They published the classic ‘I'll Take My Stand: The South and the Agrarian Tradition’.

      Although he was highly regarded as a poet he was not very prolific.  However, such was the undoubted quality that in 1939 he received the Pulitzer Prize for his work ‘Selected Poems’.  He was the first poet from the south to receive such an accolade.  Fletcher’s other passion and pursuit was as an authority on modern painting, a subject on which he also published.

      A second marriage followed in 1936 to the children’s author, Charlie May Simon. They built ‘Johnswood’, a residence on the bluffs of the Arkansas River and travelled frequently to New York for shots of modern culture and intellectual stimulation as well as to the American West and South for the climate after Fletcher developed chronic arthritis.

      In 1937 he wrote his autobiography, ‘Life is My Song’.

      His developing passion for his roots and background resulted in the writing of a history of his State and published in 1947; ‘Arkansas’.

      By now Fletcher was suffering from bouts of depression and on 10th May 1950, he committed suicide by drowning himself in a pond near his home in Little Rock, Arkansas.

      Index of Contents

      PRELUDES 

      BOOK I. THE ASTER FLOWER 

      MEMORY: THE WALK ON THE BEACH 

      THE WALK IN THE GARDEN 

      THE ASTER FLOWER 

      AUTUMNAL CLOUDS 

      NIGHT SONG 

      NIGHT SONG 

      THREE NIGHTS 

      THE DAHLIAS 

      THE CONFLICT 

      THE ORDEAL

      THE VISION 

      THE CONQUEST 

      FAITH 

      THE SILENCE 

      AFTER PARTING

      REUNION 

      BOOK II. FRUIT OF FLAME 

      THE VOYAGE 

      ON THE BEACH 

      THE SECOND WALK IN THE GARDEN 

      IN THE OPEN AIR 

      IN THE HOUSE 

      ON THE VERANDAH 

      THE PARTING 

      AFTER 

      IN THE GARDEN OF DREAMS 

      THE EMPTY HOUSE 

      THE OFFERING 

      THE RETURN TO LIFE 

      BOOK III. FROM EMPTY DAYS 

      PART I. THE TREE OF LIFE 

      PART II. ALONE IN THE GARDEN 

      PART III. LOVE AND DEATH 

      PART IV. THE EMPTY DAYS 

      PART V. THE LAST BATTLE 

      BOOK IV. DREAMS IN THE NIGHT 

      THE COMING OF NIGHT 

      THE NEW LIFE 

      THE SKY-GARDEN 

      THE ONSET 

      THE CRISIS 

      FAILURE 

      DISUNION 

      THE NIGHT OF RENUNCIATION 

      IN MEMORY OF A NIGHT 

      EPILOGUE I 

      BOOK V. TOWARDS THE DARKNESS 

      FALLING LEAVES 

      AUTUMN SUNSET 

      EBB-TIDE 

      THE WALK IN THE CITY 

      THE EVERLASTING FLOWER 

      SONG OF PARTING 

      SECOND SONG OF PARTING 

      NOVEMBER DAYS 

      THREE NIGHTS 

      THE LAST COALS 

      TIME’S HARVEST 

      THE FINAL DOUBT 

      REUNION 

      POSTLUDES 

      EPILOGUE 

      JOHN GOULD FLETCHER – A CONCISE BIBLIOGRAPHY

      PRELUDES

      STROPHE

      The night wind stirred uneasily in the black boughs;

      And as I listened to it,

      I knew all the sorrows of the world

      Were creeping into my heart.

      Seven great sorrows:

      Sorrow of hunger,

      Sorrow of seeking,

      Sorrow of parting,

      Sorrow of remembering,

      Sorrow of old age,

      Sorrow of darkness.

      And as each came I saw the old years grinning at me;

      So I clenched my fists,

      And ground my teeth,

      And waited

      Till they had all entered.

      Then I shut my heart on them;

      And I laughed,

      Laughed,

      For I knew there was no more sorrow for me in the world.

      ANTISTROPHE

      The rain beat steadily in the street, midnight had long since passed,

      And as I walked along,

      Weary and wishing for sleep,

      I heard seven great joys

      Suddenly laugh tumultuously in the cavernous night:

      Joy of being,

      Joy of achieving,

      Joy of loving desperately,

      Joy of giving oneself utterly to the last;

      Joy of knowing fully one must face a final struggle,

      Joy of completion,

      Joy of death.

      But when I tried to run away from these terrible joys,

      I was taken

      And was burned in the braziers of love that the night might be less dark.

      Yet all the while I danced and sang,

      Because my sorrows were dead and because joy filled my heart.

      EPODE

      The clouds and the winds of the night fled silently away before dawn

      That uprose

      Clear and confidently smiling, upon her forehead a star.

      She came to be for ever and ever

      Sorrow and joy to me

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