Richard Wilbur (1921-2017) came to the Berkshires by way of Amherst College, where his literary gift became evident, which led to teaching positions at Wellesley College, Weslyan University, and Smith College; he was a founder of the Wesleyan University Press, recipient of two Pulitzer Prizes, and was the second Poet Laureate of the U.S.. For a time he and William Jay Smith were neighbors in Cummington, hometown of William Cullen Bryant, ancestor of all American poets.
Poetry by Richard Wilbur
Here are the open stanzas of Advice to a Prophet, which show the influence on his work of WWII service:
When you come, as you soon must, to the streets of our city,
Mad-eyed from stating the obvious,
Not proclaiming our fall but begging us
In God’s name to have self-pity,
Spare us all word of the weapons, their force and range,
The long numbers that rocket the mind;
Our slow, unreckoning hearts will be left behind,
Unable to fear what is too strange.
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