Daily Writings in your Daily Journal

What's your real meaning?

Almost every day, we'll try to write in our daily journals. Today we wrote about Billy Collins' poem, 'Introduction to Poetry.' Journals aren't graded but are a place to think aloud. Read the poem once, then again, then annotate words or lines that jump out at you. Find something specific to start, perhaps a word, image, or line that attracts your attention (for example, "drop a mouse into"--or any of the red-colored words below). How can you 'drop a mouse into' a poem? (Let your imagination envision it!) Use your writing to explore language, images, or ideas that interest you but that you haven't figured out yet. Journal writing can help you think. ("Writing is Thinking," they say.)

I ask them to take a poem
and hold it up to the light
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.

I want them to waterski
across the surface of a poemwaving 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.

They begin beating it with a hose
to find out what it really means.

Students have been taught to demand from a poem its real meaning, almost like a confession. But the poem's metaphors, similes, and figurative language (see p.22 and 1489 in textbook) imply not an intellectual but an experiential encounter ('listen' or 'feel') or one involving the 5 senses (see) or even a playful romp with the poem ('waterski across'). How do Collins' images and language redirect our interactions with poetry? (As you analyze this poem to death, what hypocrisy are we guilty of?)