Hi Sam,
Lest this get lost as a p.s. to the previous post, I'm adding another.
Reading down on the same "Modern American Poetry" page I linked to above, there is this:
Quote:
Indeed, the archaic dimension of the "Metro" poem is more pronounced than Pound suggests. He dates the origin of the poem to 1911, without indicating any possible precedent in his earlier published poetry. K. K. Ruthven has demonstrated, however, that the specific "image" of the "Metro" poem derives from a very early poem of Pound's, "Laudantes Decem Pulchritudinis Johannae Templi," published in Exultations (1909). One section of the poem, addressed to "my beloved of the peach trees," describes "the vision of the blossom":
the perfect faces which I see at times
When my eyes are closed—
Faces fragile, pale, yet flushed a little,
like petals of roses:
these things have confused my memories of her. ( CEP 119 )
The essential features of this vision" survive intact in the "Metro" poem:
The apparition of these faces in the crowd:
Petals, on a wet, black bough. ( GB 89)
(Daniel Tiffany)
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Perhaps this is what David M. is thinking of?
At any rate, if it's true that Pound nicked the Metro image from one of his own poems, published years before, then whatever else may be said of the matter, his explanation of the "inspiration process" certainly is (at least partly) "myth."
Hope that's helpful.
Steve C.