Paterson (Revised Edition)

Odysseus swims in as man must always do, he doesn’t drown, he is too able but, accompanied by his dog, strikes inland again (toward Camden) to begin again.

AUTHOR’S NOTE

Paterson is a long poem in four parts—that a man in himself is a city, beginning, seeking, achieving and concluding his life in ways which the various aspects of a city may embody—if imaginatively conceived—any city, all the details of which may be made to voice his most intimate convictions. Part One introduces the elemental character of the place. The Second Part comprises the modern replicas. Three will seek a language to make them vocal, and Four, the river below the falls, will be reminiscent of episodes—all that any one man may achieve in a lifetime

PREFACE

“Rigor of beauty is the quest. But how will you find beauty when it is locked in the mind past all remonstrance