Introduction To Poetry By Billy Collins

The Art of Poetry

Poetry is a form of art, and art should be interpreted and read with joy, but why do we always go so far into the poem’s meaning, that we lose sight of the actual intent and joy that poetry should be viewed as? In “Introduction to Poetry” by Billy Collins, the speaker, portrayed as a teacher, asks his students to takes a poem and view and search the poem for its different perspectives, find understanding, and discover the intent. Thought the speaker wants his students to search for a deeper interpretation and view it from their own perspective, he does not want them to go so deep that they lose sight of the actual intent and joy that the poem gives to every reader. He does not want them to go so deep because some …show more content…
The speaker asks the student “to take a poem and hold it up to the light like a color slide”. A color slide is a small transparent tool used for projection onto a larger screen. To the naked eye, the slide seems dark and the information or image seems to be absent or vague. But when one takes the time, to focus the color slide up to the light, the image can be seen for what is actually is. This is what the speaker is asking from his students. He wants the students to hold the poem up to a light, a light that gives understanding, inspiration, and purpose. To hold in the light that represents a deeper meaning, lets the reader view it from a different perspective. From the poem being dark and unclear in its intent, the reader can understand its deeper meaning with clarity after holding it to the light. The speaker then asks the students to “walk inside the poem’s room and feel the walls for a light switch.” The speaker’s purpose in this request is to create a visual image of how one should search for the meaning of a poem. Inside this room, absent of light and understanding, we are unfamiliar with what is actually in the room. Nailed to the wall are these “pictures”, the “pictures” cannot be seen until we first find the light that will illuminate the room to reveal these images. Just as the color slide was unclear until held up to the light, …show more content…
The speaker wants his students “to waterski across the surface of the poem” to understand the general purpose and outline of a poem. When the reader gets the visual of waterskiing, it comes with images of joy, adventure, and living in the moment. The speaker does not want the reader to lose sight of what is happening on the surface, because they are so focused on going deeper and deeper into the poem’s depths. On the surface, they can find adventure, reading the poem for the art that is is, and not having to morph the meaning based on a different perspective. Seeing it from the surface lets the reader see the beauty and joy that is around them. By skiing on the surface, we have access to abundant light, we no longer have to search for that light. When we see the surroundings, we see the beauty of the poetry and the joy that comes with it, and “waving to the author’s name on the shore”, gives an appreciation to the poem as a whole and an appreciation to the one that wrote it. Seeing it as art helps the reader also understand that it is all about each person’s interpretation. Everyone reads the surface the same, each reader reads the words and lines for each poem for what they are, and each get the same generalizations of the themes