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Subject:          Ezra Pound and Robert Duncan
 
 
Dear Sirs:
I guess you know very well that Ezra Pound was a great master for the young
poets
trying to create something new after World War 2. Robert Duncan (1919-88)
also admired
Pound very much and wrote some poems that remind us of Pound's teaching.
It is said that "The question," a piece in The Opening of the Field (1960),
is such a poem.
If you do not mind, would you take a look at the following?
 
THE QUESTION
 
Have you a gold cup
dedicated to thought
that is like clear water
held in flower?
 
or sheen of the gold
burnished on wood
to furnish fire-glow
a burning in sight only?
 
color of gold, feel of gold
weight of gold? Does the old alchemist
speak in metaphor
of spiritual splendor?
 
or does he remember
how that metal is malleable?
chalice worked of gold at the altar,
chausible elaborated in gold?
 
in Cuzco llamas od solid gold in the Inti Pampa
the Sun's field with Stars, Lighting, Rainbow, Moon
round it? or impounded  at Fort Knox?
what wealth without show?
 
When money at last moves a free medium
using work as measure, justified
to needs man's common nature heeds,
will there be riches for public pleasure?
 
Will the good metal return
to use? gold leaf to the house roof?
our treasure above ground
sure glow for the eye to see?
 
For tho les malades imaginaires,
who puddle in their psyches
to suck their own bones, declare
lucre is shit,
 
gold is to the artisan potent
for beauty; and money remains
"the growing grass that can nourish the living sheep",
real only as that manly trust
 
we know as the field of accumulated good,
the keep
of justice     our labors
that gold head of the wheat thrive
 
for the common bread.
Work the old images from the hoard,
el trabajo en oro that gives wealth semblance
and furnishes ground for the gods to flourish.
 
O have you a service of rich gold
to illustrate the board of public goods?
as in the old days     regalia of gold
to show wherein the spirit had food?
 
According to the interview of Duncan, the poem above is an answering poem
for Ezra Pound and there are many allusions to Pound's works. But it is
really hard for me to find them out. I can only tell that Duncan alludes to
"Canto 45," "Canto 51" and an early poem "The Alchemist." If you do not
mind, would you point out the specific parts of this poem referring to
Pound's writings? What is "el trabajo en oro" ?  I will really appreciate if
you indicate many points as possible.
 
Sincerely yours,
 
           Koichiro Yamauchi
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