{"id":134556,"date":"2019-03-15T18:27:47","date_gmt":"2019-03-15T22:27:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/?p=134556"},"modified":"2019-03-18T10:15:39","modified_gmt":"2019-03-18T14:15:39","slug":"w-s-merwin-1927-2019","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2019\/03\/15\/w-s-merwin-1927-2019\/","title":{"rendered":"W. S. Merwin, 1927\u20132019"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>

W.\u2009S. Merwin.<\/p><\/div>\n

We\u2019re sad to report that W.\u2009S. Merwin, one of America\u2019s finest poets, has died at age ninety-one. The recipient of nearly every literary award imaginable, Merwin was incredibly prolific over the course of his long career, and this shows in the amount of work he contributed to The Paris Review<\/em>: thirty-six poems, a short story<\/a>, an essay<\/a>, selections from a travel journal<\/a>, and an Art of Poetry interview<\/a>. \u201cThe kind of writing that matters most to me is something you don\u2019t learn about,\u201d Merwin tells Edward Hirsch in his interview. \u201cIt\u2019s constantly coming out of what I don\u2019t know rather than what I do know. I find it as I go. In a sense, much that is learned is bound to be bad habits. You\u2019re always beginning again.\u201d <\/p>\n

Merwin\u2019s first appearance in these pages was in the Winter 1955 issue, to which he contributed the poem \u201cSow<\/a>.\u201d Even in this early poem, published just three years after he won the prestigious Yale Younger Poets Prize, one can see the clarion language and the careful curiosity about nature that define so much of his work. \u201cThere is an archipelago rising,\u201d the poem begins. \u201cOut of the green waters that, rippling\u2009\/\u2009And swaying, are the oak tree\u2019s shadow\u2009\/\u2009In the afternoon wood.\u201d<\/p>\n

But Merwin was more than a mere observer; he was an activist, too, and fought throughout his life to oppose war and to direct attention toward environmental issues. He lived for a long time in Hawaii, where he helped restore the land around his house into one of the most comprehensive palm forests on the planet. \u201cWe don\u2019t have to be sentimental and pious about it,\u201d Merwin says about nature, \u201cbut we can\u2019t turn our backs on that fact and survive. When we destroy the so-called natural world around us we\u2019re simply destroying ourselves. And I think it\u2019s irreversible.\u201d<\/p>\n

Below, we\u2019ve rounded up a few of our favorite Merwin poems from the archive.<\/p>\n

From the Autumn\u2013Winter 1957 issue, \u201cThe Frozen Sea<\/a>\u201d:<\/em><\/p>\n

We walked on it, in the very flesh
\nNo different only colder, as was
\nThe sea itself. It was simple as that.
\nOnly, the wind would not have it, would not
\nHave it: the whiteness at last
\nBearing us up where we would go \u2026<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

From the Winter 1987 issue, \u201cThe Solstice<\/a>\u201d:<\/em><\/p>\n

They say the sun will come back
\nat midnight
\nafter all
\nmy one love<\/p>\n

but we know how the minutes
\nfly out into
\nthe dark trees
\nand vanish \u2026<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

From the Summer 2004 issue, \u201cTo the Dog Stars<\/a>\u201d:<\/em><\/p>\n

But there is only one of you
\nthey say as though they knew
\nand it may even be true
\none moment at a time
\nalong the journey of light
\nyet they keep finding you \u2026<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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