Some Ramblings on Wallace Stevens "Course of a Particular"

In looking at Wallace Steven’s poem “The Course of a Particular” one quickly becomes aware of critical questions of what it is to exist. I examined some interesting secondary source criticism that brought to bear the conscious analytical powers of venerable Northrop Frye and the always insightful Harold Bloom. It was a tad bit wordy, but offered at least one fascinating thread of thought. Within a singularity, the entire web of interconnectedness collapses. Such a collapse precipitates an annihilation of meaning. This comes about due to the fact that meaning is created and relies upon the comparison and connection with the other. An electron is only an electron because it shares certain aspects of its existence with other objects, and differs from others in certain senses. Without meaning there is nothing. As such nothing literally stands alone. In so much as there is an interconnection between objects, there is an existence and hence meaning. There is a Wallace Stevens, because there is another creature that has existed within the same plane of existence as him. It is the interconnectedness that provides of the chance to exist. Laws of the physical universe run according to the same philosophy. If one thinks about a black hole, aka a point of singularity, it is the sole place where all the rules of existence breakdown. The underlying principles of dynamics that orchestrate the runnings of universe collapse under its solitary existence.
That said, how does this theory apply to Stevens’ The Course of a Particular”. A dark piece of work, his poem deals with the demise of solitary leaf in the encroaching winter. The leaf is important as long as it exists; it is part of the fabric that defines the meaning of existence. In so long as it contains a divine consciousness, that is an off shoot of the great oversoul (see Thoreau or transcendentalism), it has meaning. As the leaf cries, it cries only as its divine soul remains part of its faltering material existence. The poem ends referring to the cry as one that concerns no one at all. This is because it fades and no longer relates to us, and what it means to existence. It is a solitary cry, and lacks that connectedness that is required to provide meaning. As it is the last leaf, there is no longer anything to measure it by.
“And though one says that one is part of everything, There is a conflict a resistance involved; And being part is an exertion that declines: One feels the life of that which gives as it is.” This is the struggle between defining oneself as an individual and as a collective of existence. The individuality of the person, inbred within the psyche of what it is to be American is forever at odds with what it is to be one’s self, yet part of the whole. In the French language, the term individual is actually quite derogatory. Such is not the case in the American lexicon. This brings us to an interesting path of thought. What it is to be American can only exist in relation to everything else. It means that there is an interrelation between individuals that, more or less, define themselves by their individualism. Odd, but very interesting. Does this mean that the American ideal of individualism brings about collectivity which defines them as a whole? What does this say about American literature? I’m still working through this.