Explore "Chickory and Daisies" by William Carlos Williams on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
Lift your flowers / on bitter stems / chickory!
Lift them up / out of the scorched ground!
Bear no foliage / but give yourself / wholly to that!
Strain under them / you bitter stems / that no beast eats -- / and scorn greyness!
Into the heat with them: / cool! luxuriant! sky-blue!
The earth cracks and / is shriveled up; / the wind moans piteously; / the sky goes out / if you should fail.
II
I saw a child with daisies / for weaving into the hair / tear the stems / with her teeth!