This poem, from Stevens' first volume. Harmonium (1923), is frequently referred to by critics; but few of them have advanced an interpretation. Many have been impressed by its stylistic brilliance, its jazzy rhythms and its surface delights, often adding that in spite of the fact that it is a minor tour de force, it should not be considered one of his best poems. Yet it is certainly a key poem in Stevens' early work, and surely merits the effort of interpretation and analysis. Marius Bewley, in The Complex Fate (1952), makes the one extended attempt at interpretation that is readily available. It is ingenious and relevant to Stevens' themes, but seems to us to be rather over-elaborate, and rather inclined to project the themes of Stevens' later verse back over his earlier work.