"I Have Eaten The Plums That Were In The Icebox..."

Okay, I'm not much into poetry and I know it's taken out of context, but I had to share this excerpt included on the reverse of the new 20th Century Poets stamps:



Attributed to:



Anyone pickup their pane of these 20th century poets stamps yet? From a philatelic perspective, of particular note is that the pane has only one plate number and no microprinting. The stamps are also sized quite small, just slightly larger than a typical definitive stamp:



Frankly, I had to do some web surfing to find out the history of those being commemorated, as I had little previous knowledge of their works.

You put plums in the ice a box ??

Sure would have been a nice touch if the post office had placed e. e. cummings name in lower case letters as he always seem to prefer it.

HOORAY! - no Robert Frost on the sheet!

My fave:


Anecdote of a Jar - Wallace Stevens

I placed a jar in Tennessee,
And round it was, upon a hill.
It made the slovenly wilderness
Surround that hill.

The wilderness rose up to it,
And sprawled around, no longer wild.
The jar was round upon the ground
And tall and of a port in air.

It took dominion every where.
The jar was gray and bare.
It did not give of bird or bush,
Like nothing else in Tennessee.

Interesting. I remember the poem itself quite well from high school, but if not for this post or those stamps telling me, wouldn't have bothered to look up who wrote it.. So, thanks for posting! It shows the importance of commemorating culture on stamps.

Also, according to this Wiki bio, Sylvia Plath had quite a tragic story, battling depression and having committed suicide at the age of 30 ... and her son did likewise in 2009:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sylvia_Plath

Plath is one of my all time favorites. I will have to get some of her books back out and post one.

And again,another "fine" cast of characters.