Heartless?

stevensWallace Stevens is hard to miss in the landscape of contemporary American poets. He’s famous for his intricate, fanciful poems, as well as for the fact that he worked throughout his career as an insurance executive. He can seem dry and intellectual–difficult–but worth the trouble to unravel.

Two things about Stevens–apparently the other execs at Hartford Accident and Indemnity didn’t think too much of him. His boss was quoted in a recent bio: “Unless they told me he had a heart attack I never would have known he had a heart.” Berryman was kinder:

…something…something…not there in his
flourishing art…
What was it missing, then, at the man’s heart
so that he does not wound?
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