Peter Quince at the Clavier

To make a complete analysis of Wallace Stevens's poem, I think you might have to be much smarter than I am; but, I found the parts relating to the elders very interesting, considering the book of Susannah as a referent.

The elders in the story are very lustful (as is typical with men who aren't heroes, and are faced with a beautiful woman), and because they are rebuked by the noble Susannah, they become vengeful, and try to destroy her. But, the Lord helps Susannah, and all is well. While this story is an interesting, and a very fun read, it doesn't reach the intellectual and emotional level that Stevens's poem achieves.

Take, for instance, these lines:

 

Susanna's music touched the bawdy strings

Of those white elders; but, escaping,

Left only Death's ironic scraping.

 

This poem strikes a chord with me, conjuring an image of youth and beauty, and its finiteness. The poem doesn't seem to be judging the lustful elders, so much as reminding us all of what beauty is, and, in the lines of the poem:

The body dies; the body's beauty lives