{"id":254,"date":"2025-09-24T21:40:03","date_gmt":"2025-09-24T21:40:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/hartfordlit.org\/?p=254"},"modified":"2026-01-28T19:25:06","modified_gmt":"2026-01-28T19:25:06","slug":"domination-of-black","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hartfordlit.org\/?p=254","title":{"rendered":"Domination of Black"},"content":{"rendered":"

Stevens said of this poem, \u201cits sole purpose is to fill the mind with the images and sounds that it contains.\u201d\u00a0 As you read this poem, try not to look for specific ideas or meaning.\u00a0 Instead, try to imagine these images and sounds fully, as if you are really experiencing them.\u00a0 How does the poem make you feel?<\/em><\/p>\n

Domination of Black<\/strong><\/h2>\n

by Wallace Stevens<\/strong><\/p>\n

At night, by the fire,
\nThe colors of the bushes
\nAnd of the fallen leaves,
\nRepeating themselves,
\nTurned in the room,
\nLike the leaves themselves
\nTurning in the wind.
\nYes: but the color of the heavy hemlocks
\nCame striding.
\nAnd I remembered the cry of the peacocks.<\/p>\n

The colors of their tails
\nWere like the leaves themselves
\nTurning in the wind,
\nIn the twilight wind.
\nThey swept over the room,
\nJust as they flew from the boughs of the hemlocks
\nDown to the ground.
\nI heard them cry–the peacocks.<\/p>\n

Was it a cry against the twilight
\nOr against the leaves themselves
\nTurning in the wind,
\nTurning as the flames
\nTurned in the fire,
\nTurning as the tails of the peacocks
\nTurned in the loud fire,
\nLoud as the hemlocks
\nFull of the cry of the peacocks?
\nOr was it a cry against the hemlocks?<\/p>\n

Out of the window,
\nI saw how the planets gathered
\nLike the leaves themselves
\nTurning in the wind.
\nI saw how the night came,
\nCame striding like the color of the heavy hemlocks.
\nI felt afraid.
\nAnd I remembered the cry of the peacocks.<\/p>\n

Wallace Stevens, \"Domination of black\" from Harmonium<\/i>. (New York:\u00a0<\/strong>Alfred A. Knopf, 1923. Public domain.)<\/pre>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Stevens said of this poem, \u201cits sole purpose is to fill the mind with the images and sounds that it contains.\u201d\u00a0 As you read this poem, try not to look for specific ideas or meaning.\u00a0 Instead, try to imagine these images and sounds fully, as if you are really experiencing them.\u00a0 How does the poem … Continue reading Domination of Black<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[71],"tags":[32,31],"class_list":["post-254","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-wallace-stevens","tag-poem","tag-poetry"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/hartfordlit.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/254","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/hartfordlit.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/hartfordlit.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hartfordlit.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hartfordlit.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=254"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/hartfordlit.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/254\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/hartfordlit.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=254"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hartfordlit.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=254"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hartfordlit.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=254"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}