I Shall Imagine Beauty

i shall imagine life
by e e cummings


i shall imagine life
is not worth dying,if
(and when)roses complain
their beauties are in vain

but though mankind persuades
itself that every weed's
a rose,roses(you feel
certain)will only smile


When I read this title in our old faded e e cummings collected works book, I thought great, another dull, saturated poem about life and death. It turned out, that most of the poem is about the ever changing conflicts and opinions of beauty. The poem deals mainly with mankind's perception of beauty. Each individual is entitled to their own opinion of creatures and things. But they are only judged to be beautiful if the public eye considers them beautiful. 


In the very opinionated first two lines he seems to be saying that he will only say that life is only worth dying when the real beauties say that their beauty is meaningless, or 'in vain'. Because life's not worth dying, life is worth living, and the struggles and disappointments are all part of one brilliant experience. The idea that life isn't worth dying makes sense to me but only because of the way we treat and accept the concept of death. Life is just too meaningful to make such a fuss about.

In the next two stanzas e e cummings refers to roses as a personification of all the beauties of the world and describes them as scared that once they have wilted, that they won't be beautiful. But he almost assures us and the beauties that if you're are truly a beauty that we will know in our heart of hearts and that the real beauties will only smile. Since, after all, that's the beautiful thing to do. If our minds are convinced that all weeds are roses then let them. because physical beauty can die but not the beauty of the clear cut soul.


Sadly, I don't see much in the world to support this optimism. The world has nearly succeeded in persuading us that every weed is a rose. So the "real" beauties will die in silent. How long before they and we proclaim that beauty is in vain? To not be afraid for when they are old and dying and or hopefully sometime before they will realize that we are beautiful and we are not. That beauty should hold sway over no one and people need to all accept their themselves, their lives, their fates and other. All in a perfect world.