Since feeling is first

since feeling is first
who pays any attention
to the syntax of things
will never wholly kiss you;
wholly to be a fool
while Spring is in the world

my blood approves
and kisses are a better fate
than wisdom
lady i swear by all flowers. Don’t cry
—the best gesture of my brain is less than
your eyelids’ flutter which says

we are for each other: then
laugh, leaning back in my arms
for life’s not a paragraph

and death i think is no parenthesis

e e cummings (1894 – 1962)

S1 – eec did not pay any attention to traditional syntax (he developed his own unique syntactical way of expression) … he is talking about love and feelings and how love is expressed, and if you think of syntax in relation to love – which to me relates to discipline and order – then it becomes an inhibiter of full expression, and in relation to a kiss it will not be a full kiss in all its enormity – scary, because if you are totally uninhibited in your love life you may become the stereotyped fool – love and fool both being four letter words that combine to form a bit of an oxymoron.

S2 – Perhaps everyone becomes a bit of a moron when spring is in the air, not me of course for I have English heritage. eec swears by all the flowers that his best brain gesture stands no match for the flutter of an eyelid which dissolves all reason. Love and flattery always have connection, so too love and laughter.

S3-4 Interestingly, you can’t put death in brackets and life is not a paragraph … eec indicates he is putting his writing to one side for the sake of love … (it is a whole story of many chapters … the question is whether there is a full stop to the last sentence … well of course there is a no full stop as you can see in the above!)

Details of e e cummings on Wikipedia … https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E._E._Cummings

NB Syntax – the ordering of and relationship between the words and other structural elements in phrases and sentences. The syntax may be of a whole language, a single phrase or sentence, or of an individual speaker.

May all those love-fools enjoy this day with a laugh!