“Our spring / is the yes of yes”: E. E. Cummings and the Rhetorical Formula “X of X”

ABSTRACT

This article attempts to characterize and typify the poetic potential of phrases that take the form of “x of x” or “x’s x.” While some, like “heart of hearts,” are prevalent in everyday discourse, examples are drawn primarily from American modernist poet E. E. Cummings, whose poetics relied on this rhetorical formula and who used it extensively and creatively throughout his poetry for multiple poetic goals. To account for the wide range of uses and functions of “x of x,” they are divided into three main types, gradually increasing in poetic qualities: the basic genitive, like “the hope of hope,” entails a recursive structure and a sense of self-containment and potential for infinity; the superlative genitive, like “queen of queens,” entails a hyperbolic intensification of the x; and the cryptic genitive, like “the ears of my ears,” entails a teasing out of a vague, metaphorical term x that seems the essence of the literal x.