Discovering Mansfield’s poetry

Katherine Mansfield’s poem The Candle is the Guardian’s ‘Poem of the Week’. “Mansfield is rightly praised for her short stories,” Carol Rumens. “As a poet, however, she is virtually forgotten — ignored even — by the 2th century anthologists dedicated to the recovery and re-evaluation of neglected women poets. That’s why I didn’t expect much more than a literary curiosity when I picked up an elegant little 193 edition of Poems by Katherine Mansfield in my local Amnesty bookshop. Mansfield sometimes uses regular rhyme schemes, but for The Candle she prudently chooses free verse. The narrative is spare, vivid and well paced, its many one-line sentences creating an effect of dramatic pauses: “By my bed, on a little round table, The Grandmother placed a candle. / She gave me three kisses telling me they were three dreams / And tucked me in just where I loved being tucked. / Then she went out of the room and the door was shut. / I lay still, waiting for my three dreams to talk; / But they were silent.