The Load of the Sugar Cane
The Load of the Sugar Cane - context Summary
Published in Harmonium, 1923
Published in Stevens’s 1923 collection Harmonium, "The Load of the Sugar Cane" draws on tropical imagery likely inspired by his travels to Florida. The short lyric compresses visual and auditory impressions—boats, sugar cane, rainbows, kildeer—into a moment of observation. Its language reflects Stevens’s dual life as an insurance executive and a modern imagist poet, blending precise, economical description with an imaginative, almost ceremonial cadence.
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