Spring and All

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Spring and All is the name of a 1923 book and a poem written by William Carlos Williams.

[edit] Poem

The first half of the poem reveals a memory of a road leading to a hospital to all its readers. An implied metaphor occurs within the second half of the poem; the dawning spring is compared to a newborn baby. There is no rhyme scheme to this poem, so the stanzas are free verse - as is the case with many Imagist poetry. Another poetic method used by the author is repetition. “Standing and fallen patches of standing water” and “wildcarrot leaf…outline of leaf” both have a repeated word. Assonance can be found in the constant “a” vowel sound in the phrase “standing and fallen patches of standing water…the scattering.” Last, personification is used when the poem states, “rooted, they grip down and begin to awaken.”

The poem explains the elegance of spring’s arrival. Spring is a climatic thing, the end of the harsh cold and the beginning of new life. The author seems to feel like spring and birth have the same foundations and effects. He hints at this with the words “contagious hospital” and “they enter the new world naked, cold, uncertain of all save that they enter,” both relating to a newborn baby. When a child or a plant is “rooted, they grip down and begin to awaken” in growth and in brilliance. In winter, nature is “lifeless in appearance, [as] sluggish dazed spring approaches.” Everything is predictable; “all about them [is] the cold, familiar wind.” Spring brings variance and unpredictable events; “Now the grass, tomorrow the stiff curl of wildcarrot leaf.”