to capture something of the phenomenal moment

more from anne carson, the art of poetry no. 88 (bolding my own):

…She [George Eliot] describes clouds moving over the sun at eleven o’clock in the morning on a path in an oak forest and it’s just exactly how that would be. I admire that more than any other aspect of writing.

…and that’s the reason why I find Chinese and Japanese poetry satisfying. Because it seems to have the same aim. In fact, it’s their whole mechanism of insight into reality, to capture something of the phenomenal moment and then to let that exude a meaning larger than the moment.