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O Distinct by E.E. Cummings

Analysis

"O Distinct" is seen as a serious yet romantic poem. Cummings asks the "distinct lady" to accept him and escape the crazy world and settle down into a quiet life. Even though it is written in a serious manner, there are still instances of dada. Dada, of course, can be serious, but it is normally used as a way for Cummings to confuse us, find several meanings, or as a way to add humor to an otherwise serious situation.

This poem speaks of his love for the woman of his "unkempt adoration". He wishes they would die together and live with the "noiseless worms". He says how faithful he has been to her and never speaks ill against her. So he asks her to take him and be with him forever.

Poem

O Distinct
By 

O Distinct
Lady of my unkempt adoration
if I have made
a fragile certain

song under the window of your soul
it is not like any songs
(the singers the others
they have been faithful

to many things and which
die
i have been sometimes true
to Nothing and which lives

they were fond of the handsome
moon    never spoke ill of the
pretty stars    and to
the serene the complicated

and the obvious
they were faithful
and which i despise,
frankly

admitting i have been true
only to the noise of worms
in the eligible day
under the unaccountable sun)

Distinct Lady
swiftly take
my fragile certain song
that we may watch together

how behind the doomed
exact smile of life's
placid obscure palpable
carnival where to a normal

melody of probable violins dance
the square virtues with the oblong sins
perfectly
gesticulate the accurate

strenuous lips of incorruptible
Nothing    under the ample
sun, under the insufficient
day under the noise of worms

Published in The Dial, .

Next: O sweet spontaneous

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Nationality
American

Literary Movement
Modernism, 19th Century

Subjects
Love, Relationship