Quote from
The House of Dust: A Symphony by
Conrad Aiken (1889-1973), an American
poet &
novelist from
Savannah, Ga. and
best known for his lyric verse, e.g.,
Selected Poems (1929,
Pulitzer),
A Letter from Li Po (1955) and his Collected Poems won the US
National Book Award in 1954. He was educated at
Harvard University. Other works include the novels
Blue Voyage (1927) and
Great Circle (1933) and short stories (many of them based
on
psychoanalysis), along with critical essays, and an
autobiography (1952).
Aiken held the Chair of Poetry
of the
Library of Congress from 1950 to 1952 and was
awarded the Gold Medal for Poetry by the National
Institute of Arts and Letters in 1958.
"Music I heard with you was more than music, and bread I broke with you was more than bread. Now that I am without you, all is desolate; all that was once so beautiful is dead."
Further Reading:
Earth Triumphant and Other Tales in Verse (1914)
Cats and Bats and Things with Wings (1965)
Preludes (1966)
Selected Poems (1969)
Thee (1971).