“Things as they are have been destroyed.
Have I? Am I a man that is dead
At a table on which the food is cold?
Is my thought a memory, not alive?
Is the spot on the floor, there, wine or blood
And whichever it may be, is it mine?”

— Wallace Stevens

The Man With the Blue Guitar (1937)

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Wallace Stevens 278

American poet 1879–1955

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