Thirteen Ways Of Looking At A Blackbird by Wallace Stevens.

It’s often tempting to apply our initial perspective on a problem without pausing to diverge. This week I was reminded by this classic Stevens poem that there are always multiple points of view to examine any situation from. 

One thing that used to annoy me about this poem: The 13th stanza doesn’t reach a satisfactory conclusion. (Jim Harrison tells us “Life is short on conclusions and that’s why it’s often a struggle to end a poem").

It’s a partial framework on offer here. How to diverge. You’ll have to do the work to converge. It took me a look time to come to terms with this. In my younger days I wanted the full recipe, or nothing at all.