-- By E.E. Cummings --
Edward Estlin Cummings was born October 14th, 1894 and was a prolific American writer through poetry, books, stage plays, essays, and TWO autobiographical novels. Cummings was one of the pioneers of modern free-form poetry including the use of irregular lowercase spellings as a vessel of artistic expression.
During the First World War Cummings enlisted into the Ambulance Corp through the American Field Service where he met fellow novelist and French literary translator William Slater Brown. The two were able to explore Paris for five weeks thanks to not receiving assignment due to a clerical error. During the war Cummings wrote his first novel, The Enormous Room, which was published in 1922 (just two years after this poem) and was lauded even by the likes of F. Scott Fitzgerald.
Following the war, Cummings returned to Paris a number of times and even lived there for a short time. He continues to travel extensively through the rest of his life. E.E. Cummings passed away on September 3, 1962 at the age of 67.
