This little book by J. Pitts Sanborn '00 contains a prefatory sonnet and 17 poems in "vers libre," 17 quick glances at the city of Bordeaux in war time. Mr. Sanborn's love for Bordeaux is sincere, if we may judge from these lines in the sonnet:

"Rest lightly, war, upon this ancient town. . . . .

Seek not to turn all vintages to blood;

Leave me one day, war, on a brown stream,

The crumbling cornices, the dust, my dream."

But these lines might apply to almost any old French city in war time, and they give us a clue to the first defect of the book. The author has not found the soul of Bordeaux, that something which exists in every old city and distinguishes it from all other cities. He has the external features, the names of streets and parks, the jangling of old bells, the seasoned stone of the buildings, bridges and docks, and the "spire-shattered" sky. But frequently he seems to have been too busy being an imagist to be a poet as well. I do not mean to disparage imagism save when it becomes a conscious pose. Then it goes in search of the strange angle of vision, the unheard-of adjective, the interpretation of sounds in the terms of sight, of color in the terms of feeling and so forth. The author may adorn his poetry with these things, but if he writes his verse for the sake of these things and nothing else, he becomes an aesthetic gymnast, more a psychologist than a poet.

I do not mean that Mr. Sanborn has forgotten to be a poet entirely; the lines I have quoted prove at least his good intentions, and I shall try presently to show that he has accomplished something besides the creation of crazy images. But we should have to look in vain among the ultra-brilliant conceits of Miss Lowell or the adjectival debauches of Mr. John Gould Fletcher for anything as incomprehensible as these lines from "Elevation":

"Streams frayed air

Up the ruthless spiral

Leaving of life

A tremulous spoil."

Miss Lowell is always exact; her most daring images are of great clarity; and Mr. Fletcher has a certain rhythmical richness. Neither of them ignores the grammatical restrictions of our language. But these lines are an approach to the madness of Miss Gertrude Stein.

I have tried to choose the worst set of images to show how far Mr. Sanborn's mistake can lead him. Out of justice to him I will quote the best image, an emotional image, if I may use the term. He is telling how two persons in a store talking in their alien English tongue feel themselves apart from the French crowd around them, and in a way above them, "Like a child's vague dream of principality." This is not studied; it is natural, effective. But unfortunately it stands in comparative solitude.

From the point of view of versification, these poems are open to all adverse criticism and all ridicule that has been unjustly hurled at such authentic writers of the new rhythms as Richard Aldington and F. S. Flint. Not content with writing six words as six different lines and sprawling them across the page at a downward angle of 45 degrees. Mr. Sanborn has given us lines made up of such monosyllables as "and", "up", "or," etc. And so seldom do we find any rhythmic pattern of even the "freest" kind that we are startled when it accidentally puts in an appearance. This is indeed "shredded prose."

The single artistic achievement of this book is the subtle suggestion of war that runs through it. From the first poem, in which we come to the river-dock at day-break, to the last poem, in which we rise before dawn to take an early train away from the ancient city, there is the quiet echo of fighting that is more impressive for its quietness.

If Mr. Sanborn can attain to a more melodious form of verse and learn to see and express things with less straining of the senses and the English language, the artistic insight that he has shown in the general structure of "Vie de Bordeaux" may give him a place of note among contemporary poets.