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In a short poem called "Of Modern Poetry," published in Parts of a World in 1942, Wallace Stevens discusses his aesthetic of modern poetry. The text suggests that the meaning of a modern poem derives from a complex interaction among the poet, the poem, and the reader. In essence, a poem is a mediating link between the poet's mind and the reader's mind. This link allows the reader, guided by the poet's mind through the text of the poem, to search for that which "will suffice" in the physical world (line 2). According to Stevens, the arrival at that "satisfaction" is the purpose of modern poetry (25-6). Although Stevens articulated this aesthetic of a search for satisfaction in 1940 when he composed the poem, he adhered to the idea of such a quest throughout his career as a poet. "Sunday Morning," written in 1915, and "Final Soliloquy of the Interior Paramour," written in 1951, provide excellent examples of this continuing preoccupation. However, juxtaposing these three poems also reveals differences that suggest an evolution in Stevens' aesthetic of the imagination. The older Stevens placed more emphasis on the communion between poet and reader and more explicitly introduced the idea that the imagination can be the vehicle through which that communion provides satisfaction.
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