Ezra Pound

Monumentum Aere

Monumentum Aere - meaning Summary

Legacy Versus Petty Contempt

The speaker asserts confident self-regard and mocks an unnamed interlocutor. He predicts that trivial, comic aspects of himself will be forgotten, while still implying a lasting stature beyond ephemeral ridicule. He contrasts his own durable significance with the other's future decay and even suggests the other's remains will be poor soil for grass. The tone mixes defiance, contempt, and a darkly comic sense of poetic self-assurance.

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You say that I take a good deal upon myself; That I strut in the robes of assumption. In a few years no one will remember the buffo, No one will remember the trivial parts of me, The comic detail will be absent. As for you, you will rot in the earth, And it is doubtful if even your manure will be rich enough To keep grass Over your grave.

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