The Waste Land is a 434-line Modernist poem by T. S. Eliot published in 1922. It has been called “one of the most important poems of the 20th century.” Despite the poem's obscurity—its shifts between satire and prophecy, its abrupt and unannounced changes of speaker, location and time, its elegiac but intimidating summoning up of a vast and dissonant range of cultures and literatures—the poem has become a familiar touchstone of modern literature.
Trams and dusty trees. Highbury bore me. Richmond and Kew Undid me. By Richmond I raised my knees Supine on the floor of a narrow canoe." "My feet are at Moorgate, and my heart Under my feet. After the event He wept. He promised 'a new start'. I made no comment. What should I resent?" "On Margate Sands. 300 I can connect Nothing with nothing. The broken fingernails of dirty hands. My people humble people who expect Nothing." la la To Carthage then I came Burning burning burning burning O Lord Thou pluckest me out O Lord Thou pluckest 310
The river's tent is broken: the last fingers of leaf Clutch and sink into the wet bank. The wind Crosses the brown land, unheard. The nymphs are departed. Sweet Thames, run softly, till I end my song.