Among Imagist poems, the verse of H. D. stands apart. Although she has been called "the perfect Imagist," she was never really an Imagist, as Pound defined that term anyway. Although she is credited with being one of the formulators of the three Imagist principles, she was hardly any more a "follower" of them than Guiney, Cather, or Reese. (p. 152)

If we examine the three original principles of Imagism as stated by F. S. Flint in the March 1913 issue of Poetry, we find that H. D.'s verse is related to, undoubtedly should stand as the original inspiration of, Imagism, but is in fact something else besides. The first principle is "1. Direct treatment of the 'thing,' whether subjective or objective." In a general sense, this principle in fact reflects much of women's verse in the nineteenth century. If taken literally, for example, it describes much of Dickinson's verse. Flint means, however, "direct" in the sense of being without the poet's presence or personal interjection, an impersonal poetry, such as Pound achieved in "In a Station of the Metro" or William Carlos Williams in "Poem" or "The Locust Tree in Flower." However, even in one of the first "Imagist" poems ever published, H. D.'s "Orchard" (originally titled "Priapus") in the January 1913 issue of Poetry, H. D. did not even try to achieve such an "impersonal" or "scientific" distance…. (pp. 152-53)

"2. To use absolutely no word that [does] not contribute to the presentation." This is a rule of good poetry in general and can be applied to anyone from Shakespeare to Alexander Pope. Flint meant, however, no "ornaments" or "decorations," only the "necessary" words. Pound could write this kind of poetry, as could Williams. H. D., however, could not: her parallel syntactical constructions and her careful alliterations in Sea Garden and Hymen are a different kind of word economy from that which Pound intended and which he himself practiced at this time.

"3. As regarding rhythm: to compose in sequence of the musical phrase, not in sequence of a metronome." Regardless of what Flint (and Pound) meant—and the meaning is debatable—H. D.'s prosody is more "traditional" than this principle might suggest. H. D.'s meters are based roughly on Greek meters … but, more specifically in the very early poems, her "free verse" is simply consecutive lines of different meters…. (p. 153)

However, if we assume that such critics as William Pratt and Hugh Kenner are even partially correct, then an American woman poet, H. D., was the inspiration for and an active collaborator in the formation of a major movement in American poetry [Imagism], which affected male poets. On the other hand, it is also apparent that H. D.'s verse is a culmination of certain aspects of previous American women's verse. Thus, for example, her early verse especially is permeated with female figures from classical mythology. What was a new and exciting source of poetic images for Pound Eliot, Yeats, and other men in the early twentieth century was, in fact, for H. D., a natural and traditional source of images. Moreover, like earlier American women poets, H. D. reinterpreted the classical figures in her own way. Unlike the male poets, she did not use myth as an expression of traditional (or even archetypal) values or as a vehicle for cosmic transcendence. (pp. 153-54)

One major difference, however, between H. D.'s treatment of mythological characters and their use by earlier American women poets is the complex, layered texture of H. D.'s poetry. Indeed, the major problem for the modern reader of H. D.'s verse is that we are not familiar with classical mythology and its vocabulary. In her early verse, I think that H. D. expected her reader to respond much as the ancient Athenians responded to the tragedies of Aeschylus. For the Greek tragedians and their audience, the "story" was not important (everyone knew the story of Orestes and Electra), but the method of presentation was the significant creative factor. Thus, when one reads H. D.'s Hymen, the presentation and nuances are striking, but only to one who has a firm understanding of the myths. It is possible that H. D. misjudged her audience; after all, women poets in America had been using mythological figures as personal images since 1800. On the other hand, H. D., like Pound and Eliot, may have intended to write arrogantly esoteric verse.

Unlike her fellow American women poets from 1800 to her own day, H. D. did not deal exclusively with the major female mythological characters (some are minor), nor was she careful to provide the backgrounds of their stories, as preceding women poets had. On the basis of her late poetry, it appears that H. D. originally made the mistake of assuming that many of her readers understood the classical myths as fully as she did. In her War Trilogy (1944–1946), she shifted to the better-known Christian myth of the Virgin Mary; in her final major work, Helen in Egypt (1961), she meticulously explained the entire myth, with all its various implications.

With her return to the classical myths in Helen in Egypt, H. D. continued a symbolic exploration evident throughout much of her career. Even in her earliest poetry, she had symbolically juxtaposed the values of Greece (male, rational principles) and Egypt (female, passionate principles)….

One of the few long poems written by an American woman in the twentieth century, Helen in Egypt is a mixture of poetry and prose…. H. D.'s story is based in obscure classical mythology…. (p. 155)

The poem is an attempt by H. D. to explore abstract and complex concepts; her intent is didactic, H. D., as narrator, explains what is happening or what the characters are thinking in prose, in declarative sentences, and then poetically describes the same event or thought, with a heavy reliance upon image patterns. An example of the modern poetic sequence, Helen in Egypt is the climax of H. D.'s career, both intellectually and poetically.

Not only did H. D. anticipate Modern (male and female) poetry in the various ways we have already discussed, her early attempts to incorporate techniques from the plastic arts into her verse seem also to have been innovative and seminal. In certain early poems, H. D. was working as close as she could to a mingling of the art forms. She seems to have tried to "see," to represent the visual poetic image with reference to or by means of techniques of paintings she had viewed in Europe. Such a means of expanding the visual presentation of either poetry or prose was to become more and more common in the twentieth century, both for expatriate Americans and for those who stayed in the United States.

H. D.'s early verse seems to be the first modern American verse to display such an interdisciplinary tendency. (pp. 156-57)

Thus, in several ways, H. D.'s verse represents the very earliest expression of those tendencies by which we identify poetry as Modern. Nevertheless, with her interest in mythological women, her "international" and broad humanistic tendencies, her type of prosodic experimentation, her sense of the visual image, and her refusal to be "cosmic"—her verse represents a development from many poems written by American women throughout the nineteenth century, with, as I have shown, a basis especially in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. That H. D.'s verse does not completely correspond to Pound's three dicta [for Imagism] is evidence of her independence and originality—a poetic individualism which continued until her death. (p. 158)