The Blue Guitar (by P. K. Page)

The Blue Guitar (by P. K. Page)

Original Text
P.K. Page, Coal and Roses: Twenty-one Glosas (Erin, ON: Porcupine's Quill, 2009). This poem is reproduced on the Griffin Prize Web Site (from a volume on the 2010 Canadian Shortlist).
They said, ‘You have a blue guitar,
You do not play things as they are.’
The man replied, ‘Things as they are
are changed upon the blue guitar.’
--The Blue Guitar (Wallace Stevens)
1I do my best to tell it true
2a thing exceeding hard to do
3or tell it slant as Emily
4advises in her poetry,
5and, colour blind, how can I know
6if green is blue or cinnabar.
7Find me a colour chart that I
8can check against a summer sky.
9My eye is on a distant star.
10They said, ‘You have a blue guitar.’
11‘I have,’ the man replied, ‘it’s true.
12The instrument I strum is blue
13I strum my joy, I strum my pain
14I strum the sun, I strum the rain.
15But tell me, what is that to you?
16You see things as you think they are.
17Remove the mote within your ear
18then talk to me of what you hear.’
19They said, ‘Go smoke a blue cigar!
20You do not play things as they are.’
21‘Things as they are? Above? Below?
22In hell or heaven? Fast or slow …?’
23They silenced him. ‘It’s not about
24philosophy, so cut it out.
25We want the truth and not what you
26are playing on the blue guitar.
27So start again and play it straight
28don’t improvise, prevaricate.
29Just play things as they really are.’
30The man replied, ‘Things as they are
31are not the same as things that were
32or will be in another year.
33The literal is rarely true
34for truth is old and truth is new
35and faceted – a metaphor
36for something higher than we are.
37I play the truth of Everyman
38I play the truth as best I can.
39The things I play are better far
40when changed upon the blue guitar.’
RPO poem Editors
Ian Lancashire
RPO Edition
2011