I placed a jar in Norwich
but round it was, and rolled downhill.
It made quite a mess
as it fell.

The road rode up, around and into it
it became, for a moment, a creature of wild.
The jar lay shattered on the ground
shards glimmering and sharp.

It lay around everywhere
but not grey and not bare.
The light playing with its glass
changed everything in that street.

——
Anecdote of the Jar

I placed a jar in Tennessee,
And round it was, upon a hill.
It made the slovenly wilderness
Surround that hill.

The wilderness rose up to it,
And sprawled around, no longer wild.
The jar was round upon the ground
And tall and of a port in air.

It took dominion every where.
The jar was gray and bare.
It did not give of bird or bush,
Like nothing else in Tennessee.

Wallace Stevens