{
 "id": "william-carlos-williams/a-celebration",
 "title": "A Celebration",
 "poet": "William Carlos Williams",
 "poet_slug": "william-carlos-williams",
 "language": "en",
 "book": "Sour Grapes: A Book of Poems",
 "book_slug": "sour-grapes",
 "book_kind": "volume",
 "sequence": 4,
 "container": null,
 "epigraph": null,
 "first_published": {
  "year": 1921,
  "venue": "Sour Grapes: A Book of Poems (1921)",
  "note": "First located printing is this volume; an earlier periodical printing has not been established.",
  "uncertain": false,
  "sources": [
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/35667"
  ]
 },
 "source": {
  "kind": "standard-ebooks",
  "repo": "standardebooks/william-carlos-williams_poetry",
  "file": "poetry.xhtml",
  "upstream": [
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/31878",
   "https://archive.org/details/temperscarlos00willrich",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/51997",
   "https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/006060238",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/35667",
   "https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/007676947"
  ],
  "rights": "public domain (SE dedication; underlying text pre-1931)"
 },
 "verification": {
  "level": "structural-only",
  "last_checked": "2026-08-12"
 },
 "stats": {
  "n_lines": 66,
  "n_stanzas": 7,
  "n_parts": 0,
  "longest_line_chars": 56,
  "max_indent": 8
 },
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 "stanzas": [
  [
   {
    "text": "A middle-northern March, now as always⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "gusts from the south broken against cold winds⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "but from under, as if a slow hand lifted a tide,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "it moves⁠—not into April⁠—into a second March,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "the old skin of wind-clear scales dropping",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "upon the mould: this is the shadow projects the tree",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "upward causing the sun to shine in his sphere.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "So we will put on our pink felt hat⁠—new last year!",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "—newer this by virtue of brown eyes turning back",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "the seasons⁠—and let us walk to the orchid-house,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "see the flowers will take the prize to-morrow",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "at the Palace.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Stop here, these are our oleanders.",
    "indent": 5
   },
   {
    "text": "When they are in bloom⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "You would waste words",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "It is clearer to me than if the pink",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "were on the branch. It would be a searching in",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "a colored cloud to reveal that which now, huskless,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "shows the very reason for their being.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "And these the orange-trees, in blossom⁠—no need",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "to tell with this weight of perfume in the air.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "If it were not so dark in this shed one could better",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "see the white.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "It is that very perfume",
    "indent": 6
   },
   {
    "text": "has drawn the darkness down among the leaves.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Do I speak clearly enough?",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "It is this darkness reveals that which darkness alone",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "loosens and sets spinning on waxen wings⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "not the touch of a finger-tip, not the motion",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "of a sigh. A too heavy sweetness proves",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "its own caretaker.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And here are the orchids!",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Never having seen",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "such gaiety I will read these flowers for you:",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "This is an odd January, died⁠—in Villon’s time.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Snow, this is and this the stain of a violet",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "grew in that place the spring that foresaw its own doom.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "And this, a certain July from Iceland:",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "a young woman of that place",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "breathed it toward the south. It took root there.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "The color ran true but the plant is small.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "This falling spray of snowflakes is",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "a handful of dead Februarys",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "prayed into flower by Rafael Arevalo Martinez",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "of Guatemala.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Here’s that old friend who",
    "indent": 5
   },
   {
    "text": "went by my side so many years: this full, fragile",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "head of veined lavender. Oh that April",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "that we first went with our stiff lusts",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "leaving the city behind, out to the green hill⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "May, they said she was. A hand for all of us:",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "this branch of blue butterflies tied to this stem.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "June is a yellow cup I’ll not name; August",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "the over-heavy one. And here are⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "russet and shiny, all but March. And March?",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Ah, March⁠—",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Flowers are a tiresome pastime.",
    "indent": 5
   },
   {
    "text": "One has a wish to shake them from their pots",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "root and stem, for the sun to gnaw.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Walk out again into the cold and saunter home",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "to the fire. This day has blossomed long enough.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I have wiped out the red night and lit a blaze",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "instead which will at least warm our hands",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "and stir up the talk.",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "I think we have kept fair time.",
    "indent": 8
   },
   {
    "text": "Time is a green orchid.",
    "indent": 0
   }
  ]
 ]
}