"4" [The Classroom]

1) "A deep [warm] swell." Ink, pencil, draft paper. Draft includes lines from "Love. Warmth." 

2) "Shed their remote enhancement." Ink, pencil, half sheet notepaper.

 

3) "Oct 30. Adapted from a journal." Ink, pencil, draft paper. One sketch.

 

4) "30 Nov. Now if the class." Pencil, draft paper.

5) "Quatrains give way to different forms." Ink, pencil, draft paper. Recto of a "Carnival" manuscript.

 

7) "A point or two. Quatrains give way." Ink, pencil.

Manuscript 3 is dated "Oct 30" and the heading is "Adapted from a journal." A note identifies two features: a "gradual mellowing of a viewpoint - the long wait for this - REBIRTH" and "the use of other poets." Manuscript 1 contains the phrases "objects of desire" and "love without an object."

See the link to "Langdon Hammer's Criticism" on this poem's "classroom parody" and carefully stated conception of form: “'Form' is shorthand for style or manner, the poet’s bearing on the page and not simply his skillful prosody, although that is essential to it. 'Form' implies a contract with the reader, an intimacy grounded in shared respect" (328).