Poems by William Carlos Williams

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Paterson lies in the valley under the Passaic Falls

its spent waters forming the outline of his back. He

lies on his right side, head near the thunder

of the waters filling his dreams! Eternally asleep,

his dreams walk about the city where he persists

incognito. Butterflies settle on his stone ear.

Immortal he neither moves nor rouses and is seldom

seen, though he breathes and the subtleties of his machinations

The green-blue ground

is ruled with silver lines

to say the sun is shining

And on this moral sea

of grass or dreams lie flowers

or baskets of desires

Heaven knows what they are

between cerulean shapes