Introduction to Poetry
BY BI LLY COLLI NS
I ask them to take a poem.
and hold it up to the light
The poet tells his student to first of all take a poem as it is.
They have nothing to look elsewhere. A poem is a world in
itself.
like a color slide
or press an ear against its hive.
I say drop a mouse into a poem
and watch him probe his way out,
or walk inside the poem’s room
and feel the walls for a light switch.
There are sound, visuals, colors, complexity, simplicity,
everything. A reader has to be concerned about the
senses.
I want them to waterski
Poetry generally demands an association of seeing, smelling,
feeling, and last but not least it also gives enjoyment.
across the surface of a poem
waving at the author’s name on the shore.
But all they want to do
is tie the poem to a chair with rope
and torture a confession out of it.
The poet feels dejected about the attitude of readers to
poetry. They somehow want a meaning, no matter if it has
one or not.
They begin beating it with a hose
to find out what it really means.
Tone
‘Introduction to Poetry’ by Billy Collins features a poetic persona who talks
in the poem with an ironic tone to satirize the modern sensibility
regarding poetry. In the first few stanzas, the tone is welcoming and
simple. What is in his mind, the poet says it directly. So, the tone of the
poem is also direct and to the point. In the last few stanzas, the tone of
the poem transforms into an ironic one. DIDACTIC.
Themes
‘Introduction to Poetry’ by Billy Collins introduces the theme of
appreciation of a poetic work in the first few stanzas. According to the
poet, a work of poetry is rather to be felt and enjoyed instead of brooding
on its meaning. One can truly appreciate a poem when there is an
involvement of all the five senses with the poetic work. The poet also
presents the theme of modern sensibility in the last stanza. To make the
theme more vibrant the poet uses an image of a man tied to a chair with
rope.
Imagery
There is visual imagery, auditory imagery, olfactory
imagery, and tactile imagery in the poem.
The poet uses an image of a color slide held
(visual imagery,) up to the light in the first stanza.
Thereafter he uses the images of a hive (auditory imagery),
mouse (visual imagery,), a dark room
(visual/tactile imagery,), and water skiing
(visual/tactile imagery,) in the following stanzas.
SIMILE
There is a simile in the first stanza. The comparison is
made between a poem and a color side in this line,
“and hold it up to the light/ like a color slide”.
Metaphors
* The word “hive” refers to the bees living inside it and
their sound. Hence it also presents an
implied onomatopoeia of the humming sound of bees.The
“hive” metaphorically represents the auditory imagery
within a poetic work. This is an interesting idea; each word
in work could be considered an individual worker bee. The
words are, individually less important than the whole, but
at the same time, each has its own importance. The poet
could be saying that it is more important to take in the
poem as a whole than to pull apart the hive and look at
each worker bee individually.
*The poet associates the idea of the complexity of a poem
by using the metaphor of a mouse. A poem becomes a
maze. It’s true that poems often have turns, are complex,
and for some, they can be confusing and hard to get
through. Collins, when he says he wants to “drop a mouse
into a poem . . .” could be implying that poetry is best
enjoyed and understood without a guide.
* The poet uses the metaphors of a room and a light switch
to refer to compare these with the themes in a poem and
the essence of a poetic work alternatively. Collins
compares a poem to a dark room. The readers are left to
grope blindly for the lights. This is another metaphor that
implies that people should be lost when reading poetry,
that knowledge about a poem is actually detrimental to
understanding it. A poem has fixed dimensions and can be
vast or small, like a room. It is filled with fixed items of
various values and importance.
*There is also a metaphor for the rhythm and flow of a
poem (waterski). When the poet talks about water skiing on
the surface of a poem, he metaphorically says that a poem
is fluid-like and a reader should float above it for enjoying
the work. In the fifth stanza of the poem, the poet tells
readers to enjoy a poetic work. This section refers to the
entertaining aspect of poetry. To bring home his idea, the
poet uses the image of water skiing “across the surface of
a poem”. Ironically, the element of enjoyment is present on
the surface of a poem.
* The concept of “close reading” is metaphorically
introduced here too. The “hose”, a metaphor, refers to the
analytical mindset of readers in the last section of the
poem. The metaphor here explains that poetry students
and readers only want to interrogate poems. They want
simple answers, facts, and they don’t care how they get
them. It’s clear from the universally negative image of a
defenseless person being tortured that Collins doesn’t
approve of this approach. PERSONIFICATION
‘Introduction to Poetry’ concludes with the image of a piece
of art being bluntly beaten until it reveals its secrets,
secrets that it may not even have.
