Of Mere Being

I really enjoyed the discussion we had in class about this poem because it was interpreted so many different ways, and everyone had somewhat different meanings or images from the poem. Of Mere Being by Wallace Stevens talks about a bird in a palm and the feelings involved with it. Several people take this poem for its literal meaning. There is just a bird in a palm. It is just there. This thought does go along with the title, Of Mere Being, but, to me Stevens conveys a different meaning through his diction. The first two lines of the poem were initial indicators that this poem wasn't just about a bird in a palm. "The palm at the end of the mind, Beyond the last thought," These two lines seem like the author is referring to a dream or something not conceivable in the mind with "at the end of the mind," and "Beyond the last thought." Then the author goes on to describe the bird and the palm. He uses words such as "gold-feathered," "bronze decor," and "fire-fangled feathers" these words make me think of a phoenix which is a mythical creature which makes me think even more that this poem is not just about a bird and a palm because a phoenix is not a real bird.
I remember in class people were debating the idea if whether or not this poem is about faith or not. There were two parts of this poem that make me believe this poem was, indeed, about faith. The first is in the second stanza, "A gold feathered bird Sings in the palm, without human meaning, Without human feeling, a foreign song." I think this part is talking about faith because humans cannot describe the meaning of faith or the feeling of it, because of this, I believe the author is using the bird as a symbol for faith. The second part is in the last stanza, "The palm stands on the edge of space." Heaven is typically referred to as above the earth, so when Stevens says "on the edge of space" I think he is referring to the palm as a symbol of Heaven.