Considered by many to be the most characteristically American of our twentieth-century poets, William Carlos Williams "wanted to write a poem / that you would understand / ,,,But you got to try hard—." So that readers could more fully understand the extent of Williams' radical simplicity, all of his published poetry, excluding Paterson, was reissued in two definite volumes, of which this is the first.

Collection of poems of William Carlos Williams from 1939-1962

WCW, I Wanted to Write a Poem. Williams discusses the procedure of poetry.

A dozen poems on love by a New Jersey obstetrician (1883-1963) who often wrote them on office prescription pads. In the title poem, first published when he was 72, he wrote: "What power has love but forgiveness? / In other words / by its intervention / what has been done / can be undone."

Hab?a sido un arbusto desmedrado que prolonga sus filamentos hasta encontrar el humus necesario en una tierra neuva. Y c?mo me nutr?a! Me nutr?a con la beatitud con que las hojas tr?mulas de clor?fila se extienden al sol; con la beatitud con que una ra?z encuentra un cad?ver en descompositi?n; con la beatitud con que los convalecientes dan sus pasos vacilantes en las ma?anas de primavera, ba?adas de luz... RAFAEL AR?VALO MART?NEZ

For this volume, originally published in cloth in 1961, William Carlos Williams collected, and revised, four full-length plays and the libretto of an opera on George Washington. As might be expected of the man who did most in our time to create a new and truly "American" idiom for poetry, Dr. Williams' writing for the stage challenges producers and actors to extend the range of modern drama.

William Carlos Williams's place among the great poets of our century is firmly established. This anthology of selections drawn from the whole range of his work--poetry, fiction, autobiography, drama and essays--shows conclusively that his prose was also remarkably original, versatile and powerful. It has been edited by M. L. Rosenthal, literary critic and Professor of English at New York University.