By Robert Francis
When others run to windows or out of doors
To catch the sunset whole, he is content
With any segment anywhere he sits.
From segment, fragment, he can reconstruct
The whole, prefers to reconstruct the whole,
As if to say, I see more seeing less.
A window to the east will serve as well
As window to the west, for eastern sky
Echoes the western sky. And even less—
A patch of light that picture-glass happens
To catch from window-glass, fragment of fragment,
Flawed, distorted, dulled, nevertheless
Gives something unglassed nature cannot give:
The old obliquity of art, and proves
Part may be more than whole, least may be best.
Robert Francis, “Part for the Whole” from Robert Francis: Collected Poems 1936-1976. Copyright © 1976 by Robert Francis. Reprinted with the permission of The University of Massachusetts Press.
Source: The Poetry Anthology 1912-2002 (2002)
Poet Bio
More By This Poet
Eagle Plain
The American eagle is not aware he is
the American eagle. He is never tempted
to look modest.
When orators advertise the American eagle’s
virtues, the American eagle is not listening.
This is his virtue.
He is somewhere else, he is mountains away
but even if he...
More Poems about Arts & Sciences
Poem with Human Intelligence
This century is younger than me.
It dresses itself
in an overlong coat of Enlightenment thinking
despite the disappearing winter.
It twirls the light-up fidget spinner
won from the carnival of oil economies.
In this century, chatbots write poems
where starlings wander from their murmuration
into the denim-thick...
Listening in Deep Space
We've always been out looking for answers,
telling stories about ourselves,
searching for connection, choosing
to send out Stravinsky and whale song,
which, in translation, might very well be
our undoing instead of a welcome.
We launch satellites, probes, telescopes
unfolding like origami, navigating
geomagnetic storms, major disruptions.
Rovers...
More Poems about Nature
Listening in Deep Space
We've always been out looking for answers,
telling stories about ourselves,
searching for connection, choosing
to send out Stravinsky and whale song,
which, in translation, might very well be
our undoing instead of a welcome.
We launch satellites, probes, telescopes
unfolding like origami, navigating
geomagnetic storms, major disruptions.
Rovers...
At the Equinox
The tide ebbs and reveals orange and purple sea stars.
I have no theory of radiance,
but after rain evaporates
off pine needles, the needles glisten.
In the courtyard, we spot the rising shell of a moon,
and,...