i thank You God for most this amazing by e.e. cummings

i thank You God for most this amazing
day: for the leaping greenly spirits of trees
and a blue true dream of sky; and for everything
which is natural which is infinite which is yes

(i who have died am alive again today,
and this is the sun’s birthday; this is the birth
day of life and of love and wings: and of the gay
great happening illimitably earth)

how should tasting touching hearing seeing
breathing any–lifted from the no
of all nothing–human merely being
doubt unimaginable You?

(now the ears of my ears awake and
now the eyes of my eyes are opened)

Some thoughts…

On this Poem: E. E. Cummings in his element here.

leaping greenly…blue true dream of sky…everything which is natural which is infinite which is yes…

The lyric beauty of his language, untrammeled by punctuation serves to greater highlight the sense of breathless rapture evident in this poem.

I’m not sure what Cummings’ personal beliefs were, but this poem conveys an almost religious ecstasy - a sense of intimacy with the Divine; a joy and wonder in Nature as an expression of infinite possibility; gratitude for the gift of a new day.

If he wonders how mortal man restricted by mere sensory perceptions can doubt ‘unimaginable You’, there is perhaps more than a hint of an answer in the last verse: we seek the ‘unimaginable’ not with the ear, not with the eye; but by the faculty of the Inner Spirit that causes the ears to hear and the eyes to see.

If you consider the etymology, an ‘inspired’ poet is quite literally one who is filled with the breath of the Gods; sent forth to utter, sing, or babble the truth evidenced to him. As Shakespeare said, “The lunatic, the lover, and the poet are of imagination all compact.”

Unpunctuated prose may be a sign of an incoherent mind running amuck. There, the rules are different. Prose requires first and foremost, rational thought; then, logical organization; and only then clear and concise expression. Poetic license can afford to dispense with those notions. Nobody broke those rules with quite the effect Cummings did.

On a personal note: Happy Earth Week! Wishing you all the joy and wonder of this ‘gay great happening illimitably earth’.