Valley Candle

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Valley Candle is a poem from Wallace Stevens's first book of poetry, Harmonium. It is in the public domain according to Librivox, having been first published prior to the 1923 publication year of Harmonium.[1]

Valley Candle My candle burned alone in an immense valley. Beams of the huge night converged upon it, Until the wind blew. Then beams of the huge night Converged upon its image, Until the wind blew.

"Valley Candle" is a spare and austere poem with Imagist virtues. It may be compared to "Domination of Black", which also makes use of the colors of the night, though "Domination" is more emotionally charged. Its subject might be mortality ("My candle") and the traces that one's life leaves behind, but more importantly the poetry of the subject is the striking representation of the burning candle and the image it leaves behind, each given dramatic illumination by "beams of the huge night", each crisply snuffed out when the wind blew.