Marianne Moore Poems

Marianne Moore was an important American poet born in 1887. She passed away in 1972. Her poems express her interest in everyday encounters of people and places as well as art. Animals are one of the most central symbols of her work.

The Fish

by Marianne Moore

‘The Fish’ by Marianne Moore uses imagery and form to objectively describe nature and humanity’s ability to survive and mature in the face of death, destruction, and loss.

'The Fish' by Marianne Moore achieves one of the most difficult feats in poetry: it articulates that which cannot be expressed in words. Marianne Moore is an expert imagist, compressing her meaning, and allowing her listener to decode the meaning from the emotions that each word appeals.

wade

 through black jade.

     Of the crow-blue mussel-shells, one keeps

     adjusting the ash-heaps;

          opening and shutting itself like

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