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About this quote

What does it mean?
A distant cry is compared to a new knowledge of reality within a vast cosmos.
In plain terms
A sound far away felt like learning something new.
What can you take from it?
Small signs can reveal deep truths.

Where it applies

  • inspiration
  • meditation
  • nature observation

Putting it to work

  • valuing small signals
  • seeking insight

Questions to consider

  • When did a sound teach you?
  • What feels far away yet near?

Another view

Isolated sounds do not always imply new knowledge.

More from Wallace Stevens

  1. At the earliest ending of winter, In March, a scrawny cry from outside Seemed like a sound in his mind. He knew that he heard it, A bird's cry, at daylight or …

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  2. One of the limits of reality Presents itself in Oley when the hay, Baked through long days, is piled in mows. It is A land too ripe for enigmas, too serene.: T…

    Permalink to quote #196
  3. Our own time, and by this I mean the last two or three generations, including our own, can be summed up in a way that brings into unity an immense number of de…

    Permalink to quote #193

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