E.E. Cummings your way

A few days ago, I watched the film, 'The Life and Death of Charlie St Cloud'. I rather enjoyed it (and cried a lot too), and within the film, one of the sweetest moments came from a conversation about poetry, specifically, the poetry of E.E. Cummings. Thus, he is this week's poet.

It seems as though his modernist approach to grammar means that Cummings' name was often written with lower case letters, as in, 'e. e. cummings'. So these should be some good reads. It even affects his title. I might even find that I enjoy this so much that I do a few weeks' worth of purely his works. Sorry!

i like my body when it is with your

i like my body when it is with your
body. It is so quite new a thing.
Muscles better and nerves more.
i like your body.  i like what it does,
i like its hows.  i like to feel the spine
of your body and its bones, and the trembling
-firm-smooth ness and which i will
again and again and again
kiss, i like kissing this and that of you,
i like, slowly stroking the shocking fuzz
of your electric furr,and what-is-it comes
over parting flesh….And eyes big love-crumbs,

and possibly i like the thrill

of under me you so quite new

Rather a risqué poem, I grant you. But I consider the syntax to fit so well with the ideas of experiencing the 'new', and how the words seem unbound, mimicking the freedom of the narrator's body. I have a sneaky suspicion one of the Es of his name stands for 'enjambment'.

The first line uses this technique to balance the starting 'i' with the finishing 'your', which makes the couple appear like a reflection of one another. The line 'muscles better and nerves more' uses comparatives without other adjectives to mimic the inexplicable sensations of the body, whilst presenting a distracted state of mind, one focused more on pleasure than thought.

Cummings uses the pronoun 'i' on almost every line of the poem. This is because he is of course referring to his own experience of pleasure and is almost a stream of consciousness, but I really like the fact that he has decapitalised it, because to me it helps the poem read far less self-centred, and focuses the mind more on the partner whom he is describing.

I am now going to try to unpack the image of 'eyes big love-crumbs'. Even though I have not yet pondered over it, it feels such a unique and cosy image, emphasising that this relationship is not only about the physicality but also of the person. He is not just talking about any woman/man, but a particular 'you', which comes as an intimate address to show he isn't bragging to another about her/him, but is in fact complimenting her/him, even if only mentally.

Sorry, back to my deciphering. If the eyes are big love-crumbs then I suppose the partner is looking at the narrator in a tired but affectionate way, with the 'crumbs' being the remnants of consummated passion.

The one thing I am not so sure about being positive in this poem is the adjective 'new'. Its use mkes it seem that maybe the narrator only appreciates the body he is with because it is fresh and untouched by him. And the way that it is given end focus by being the final word of the poem makes it more unsettling, from my reading at least, anyway. I do hope I am wrong and that he didn't get bored!