{"id":89984,"date":"2015-09-21T12:18:07","date_gmt":"2015-09-21T16:18:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/?p=89984"},"modified":"2015-09-21T12:18:07","modified_gmt":"2015-09-21T16:18:07","slug":"c-k-williams-1936-2015","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2015\/09\/21\/c-k-williams-1936-2015\/","title":{"rendered":"C. K. Williams, 1936\u20132015"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>

From the cover of Selected Poems.<\/i><\/p><\/div>\n

C. K. Williams, the poet known for his \u201clong, unraveled lines,\u201d died yesterday at seventy-eight. Williams realized, he told the<\/em>\u00a0New York Times, \u201cthat by writing longer lines and longer poems I could actually write the way I thought and the way I felt. I wanted to enter areas given over to prose writers, I wanted to talk about things the way a journalist can talk about things, but in\u00a0poetry, not prose.\u201d <\/em>The Paris Review published three of Williams\u2019s poems in the eighties; this one, \u201cFrom My Window,\u201d is from our Fall 1981 issue<\/a>.
<\/em><\/p>\n

Spring: the first morning when that one true block of sweet,
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 laminar, complex scent arrives
from somewhere west and I keep coming to lean on the sill,
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 glorying in the end of the wretched winter.
The scabby-barked sycamores ringing the empty lot across
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 the way are budded\u2014I hadn\u2019t noticed\u2014
and the thick spikes of the unlikely urban crocuses have
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 already broken the gritty soil.
Up the street, some surveyors with tripods are waving each
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 other left and right the way they do.
A girl in a gym suit jogged by a while ago, some kids
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 passed, playing hooky, I imagine,
and now comes the paraplegic Vietnam vet who lives in a half-
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 converted warehouse down the block
and the friend who stays with him and seems to help him
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 out come weaving towards me,
their battered wheelchair lurching uncertainly from one
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 edge of the sidewalk to the other.
I know where they\u2019re going\u2014to the \u201cLegion\u201d: once, when I
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 was putting something out, they stopped,
both drunk that time, too, both reeking\u2014it wasn\u2019t ten o\u2019clock
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u2014and we chatted for a bit.
I don\u2019t know how they stay alive\u2014on benefits most likely. I
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 wonder if they\u2019re lovers?
They don\u2019t look it. Right now, in fact, they look a wreck,
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 careening haphazardly along,
contriving, as they reach beneath me, to dip a wheel from
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 the curb so that the chair skewers, teeters,
tips, and they both tumble, the one slowly, almost gracefully
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 sliding in stages from his seat,
his expression hardly marking it, the other staggering over
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 him, spinning heavily down,
to lie on the asphalt, his mouth working, his feet shoving
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 weakly and fruitlessly against the curb.
In the storefront office on the corner, Reed and Son, Real
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Estate, have come to see the show.
Gazing through the golden letters of their name, they\u2019re not,
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 at least, thank god, laughing.
Now the buddy, grabbing at a hydrant, gets himself erect
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 and stands there for a moment, panting.
Now he has to lift the other one, who lies utterly still, a
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 forearm shielding his eyes from the sun.
He hauls him partly upright, then hefts him almost all the
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 way into the chair, but a dangling foot
catches a support-plate, jerking everything around so that
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 he has to put him down,
set the chair to rights, and hoist him again and as he does
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 he jerks the grimy jeans right off him.
No drawers, shrunken, blotchy thighs: under the thick, white
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 coils of belly blubber,
the poor, blunt pud, tiny, terrified, retracted, is almost
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 invisible in the sparse genital hair,
then his friend pulls his pants up, he slumps wholly back as
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 though he were, at last, to be let be,
and the friend leans against the cyclone fence, suddenly
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 staring up at me as though he\u2019d known,
all along, that I was watching and I can\u2019t help wondering if
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 he knows that in the winter, too,
I watched, the night he went out to the lot and walked,
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 paced rather, almost ran, for how many hours.
It was snowing, the city in that holy silence, the last we
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 have, when the storm takes hold,
and he was making patterns that I thought at first were
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 circles, then realized made a figure eight,
what must have been to him a perfect symmetry but which,
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 from where I was, shivered, bent,
and lay on its side: a warped, unclear infinity, slowly, as the
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 snow came faster, going out.
Over and over again, his head lowered to the task, he
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 slogged over the path he\u2019d blazed,
but the race was lost, his prints were filling faster than he
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 made them now and I looked away,
up across the skeletal trees to the tall center city buildings,
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 some, though it was midnight,
with all their offices still gleaming, their scarlet warning
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 beacons signaling erratically
against the thickening flakes, their smoldering auras
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 softening portions of the dim, milky sky.
In the morning, nothing: every trace of him effaced, all the
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 field pure white,
its surface glittering, the dawn, glancing from its glaze,
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 oblique, relentless, unadorned.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

C. K. Williams, the poet known for his \u201clong, unraveled lines,\u201d died yesterday at seventy-eight. Williams realized, he told the\u00a0New York Times, \u201cthat by writing longer lines and longer poems I could actually write the way I thought and the way I felt. I wanted to enter areas given over to prose writers, I wanted […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":38,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[19155,19492,20537,19491,11989,7221,165,2047],"class_list":["post-89984","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-in-memoriam","tag-c-k-williams","tag-fall-1981","tag-in-memoriam","tag-issue-81","tag-obituaries","tag-poems","tag-poetry","tag-poets"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nC. K. Williams, 1936\u20132015; Read His Poem \u201cFrom My Window\u201d<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"In memory of C. K. Williams, we\u2019re republishing his poem from our Fall 1981 issue.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2015\/09\/21\/c-k-williams-1936-2015\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"C. K. Williams, 1936\u20132015 by Dan Piepenbring\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"September 21, 2015 \u2013 C. K. Williams, the poet known for his \u201clong, unraveled lines,\u201d died yesterday at seventy-eight. 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