the formal elements of the poems are always displayed consistently. For instance, the style sheet reads the tags marking lines that the author himself has indented; should that indented line exceed the character capacity of a screen, the run-over part of the line will be indented further, and all such runovers will look the same. This combination of appropriate coding choices and style sheets makes it easy to display poems with complex indentations, no matter if the lines are metered or free, end-stopped or enjambed.
Ultimately, there may be no way to account for every single variation in the way in which the lines of a poem are disposed visually on an electronic reading device, just as rare variations may challenge the conventions of the printed page, but with rigorous quality assessment and scrupulous proofreading, nearly every poem can be set electronically in accordance with its author’s intention. And in some regards, electronic typesetting increases our capacity to transcribe a poem accurately: In a printed book, there may be no way to distinguish a stanza break from a page break, but with an ereader, one has only to resize the text in question to discover if a break at the bottom of a page is intentional or accidental.
Our goal in bringing out poetry in fully reflowable digital editions is to honor the sanctity of line and stanza as meticulously as possible—to allow readers to feel assured that the way the lines appear on the screen is an accurate embodiment of the way the author wants the lines to sound. Ever since poems began to be written down, the manner in which they ought to be written down has seemed equivocal; ambiguities have always resulted. By taking advantage of the technologies available in our time, our goal is to deliver the most satisfying reading experience possible.
THEME AND VARIATIONS:
SANTA FE, NEW MEXICO
MEDITATION IN SUNLIGHT
In space in time I sit
Thousands of feet above
The sea and meditate
On solitude on love
Near all is brown and poor
Houses are made of earth
Sun opens every door
The city is a hearth
Far all is blue and strange
The sky looks down on snow
And meets the mountain range
Where time is light not shadow
Time in the heart held still
Space as the household god
And joy instead of will
Knows love as solitude
Knows solitude as love
Knows time as light not shadow
Thousands of feet above
The sea where I am now
Who wear an envelope
Of crystal air and learn
That space is also hope
Where sky and snow both burn
Where spring is love not weather
And I happy alone
The place the time together
The sun upon the stone.
DIFFICULT SCENE
This landscape does not speak,
Exists, is simply there.
Take it or leave it; the weak
Suffer from fierce air.
For these high desolate
Lands where earth is skeleton
Make no demands; they state.
Who can resist the stone?
Implacable tranquility
That searches out the naked heart,
Touches the quick of anxiety
And breaks the world apart.
The angel in the flaming air
Is everywhere and no escape,
Asking of life that it be pure
And given as the austere landscape.
And most accompanied when alone;
Most sensitive when mastered sense;
Alive most when the will is gone,
Absence become the greatest Presence.
The golden landscape cannot save,
It only asks your right to be here.
Live, if you do not break the wave
Of time mounting the holy air.
The flaming angel does not show
The path to any near salvation.
Live, if the sun burning the snow
Suggests that passion is compassion.
THE WINDOW
Finite, exact, the square
Frames the long curve
Of hills and perpendicular
Spray of the delicate tree.
Wires, slanting, swerve
Off the flat scene;
And shining through
The mathematical window
The burning sky and the blue sun
Create a flowing fourth dimension:
The square explodes in space.
Then through the abstract window
Darkness comes down so deep
The exact mountains show
Sleep in a flowing line,
Earth in a flowing
Ultimately, there may be no way to account for every single variation in the way in which the lines of a poem are disposed visually on an electronic reading device, just as rare variations may challenge the conventions of the printed page, but with rigorous quality assessment and scrupulous proofreading, nearly every poem can be set electronically in accordance with its author’s intention. And in some regards, electronic typesetting increases our capacity to transcribe a poem accurately: In a printed book, there may be no way to distinguish a stanza break from a page break, but with an ereader, one has only to resize the text in question to discover if a break at the bottom of a page is intentional or accidental.
Our goal in bringing out poetry in fully reflowable digital editions is to honor the sanctity of line and stanza as meticulously as possible—to allow readers to feel assured that the way the lines appear on the screen is an accurate embodiment of the way the author wants the lines to sound. Ever since poems began to be written down, the manner in which they ought to be written down has seemed equivocal; ambiguities have always resulted. By taking advantage of the technologies available in our time, our goal is to deliver the most satisfying reading experience possible.
THEME AND VARIATIONS:
SANTA FE, NEW MEXICO
MEDITATION IN SUNLIGHT
In space in time I sit
Thousands of feet above
The sea and meditate
On solitude on love
Near all is brown and poor
Houses are made of earth
Sun opens every door
The city is a hearth
Far all is blue and strange
The sky looks down on snow
And meets the mountain range
Where time is light not shadow
Time in the heart held still
Space as the household god
And joy instead of will
Knows love as solitude
Knows solitude as love
Knows time as light not shadow
Thousands of feet above
The sea where I am now
Who wear an envelope
Of crystal air and learn
That space is also hope
Where sky and snow both burn
Where spring is love not weather
And I happy alone
The place the time together
The sun upon the stone.
DIFFICULT SCENE
This landscape does not speak,
Exists, is simply there.
Take it or leave it; the weak
Suffer from fierce air.
For these high desolate
Lands where earth is skeleton
Make no demands; they state.
Who can resist the stone?
Implacable tranquility
That searches out the naked heart,
Touches the quick of anxiety
And breaks the world apart.
The angel in the flaming air
Is everywhere and no escape,
Asking of life that it be pure
And given as the austere landscape.
And most accompanied when alone;
Most sensitive when mastered sense;
Alive most when the will is gone,
Absence become the greatest Presence.
The golden landscape cannot save,
It only asks your right to be here.
Live, if you do not break the wave
Of time mounting the holy air.
The flaming angel does not show
The path to any near salvation.
Live, if the sun burning the snow
Suggests that passion is compassion.
THE WINDOW
Finite, exact, the square
Frames the long curve
Of hills and perpendicular
Spray of the delicate tree.
Wires, slanting, swerve
Off the flat scene;
And shining through
The mathematical window
The burning sky and the blue sun
Create a flowing fourth dimension:
The square explodes in space.
Then through the abstract window
Darkness comes down so deep
The exact mountains show
Sleep in a flowing line,
Earth in a flowing
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