Friday, June 24, 2022

Veronica Forrest-Thomson

Veronica Forrest-Thomson (2)


Facsimile of a Waste Land


And if Another knows I have a little nut-tree cultivated indoors
I know that in this climate nothing will it bear
despite much watering with sighs and tears.

I know little of horticulture but a silver anguish
supplemented by sundry domestic details not Christmas tinselled
and a golden fear of succumbing to the violet typing-ribbon,

Who only know that in return for the kiss you gave to me,
not here, O, Adeimantus, but in another world,
there is no more noise now I hand you the fruit of

More than a year struggling with the violet and the orange peel
which is so alien to my little nut-tree embedded
in the present context of its final version.

______________
[V F-T’s ] Note: the lines:
“And if Another knows I know I know not
Who only know that there is no more noise now”
were omitted by Eliot from his final version, along with
“Not here, O, Adeimantus, but in another world”.

Pound was fond of using a violet typewriter ribbon.


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