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Jack Foley
New member
Username: Foley
Post Number: 124
Registered: 01-2010
| | Posted on Thursday, April 14, 2011 - 10:39 am: | 
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This poem by Billy Collins is being sent around the internet—with high approval rating:
Introduction to Poetry
Billy Collins
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 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.
They begin beating it with a hose
to find out what it really means.
I answered Collins' poem with this:
Introduction to Poetry
Billy Collins
Writing Between the Lines
Jack Foley
I ask them to take a poem
This disgusting poem is about
and hold it up to the light
an ego trip
like a color slide
the size of Mount
or press an ear against its hive.
Everest--this poem has nothing
I say drop a mouse into a poem
to say about how to read
and watch him probe his way out,
a poem only about the vast superiority
or walk inside the poem's room
of the mousie author (but, mousie, thou art no thy lane!)
and feel the walls for a light switch.
to the few people left
I want them to waterski
who are trying to understand the art of poetry
across the surface of a poem
It has a subtext the size of Mount
waving at the author's name on the shore.
Tamalpais, and the subtext is telling you:
But all they want to do
Go for it, feel superior, doesn’t it feel good, doesn’t it feel better
is tie the poem to a chair with rope
than to struggle with a text which is unyielding,perplexing,monumental, “difficult”
and torture a confession out of it.
but which holds you the way Jacob held the Angel
They begin beating it with a hose
and ends by telling you what the Archaic Statue told Rilke:
to find out what it really means.
You must
change
your life
Favorite lines: “I want them to waterski / across the surface of a poem.” You bet that’s what he wants.
*
I received several responses thanking me for what I said about the Billy Collins poem, none disagreeing.
I wrote this to John Bennett, who first circulated the poem. I did not change his mind:
Do you really think that telling students to
take a poem
and hold it up to the light
like a color slide
or to
drop a mouse into a poem
and watch him probe his way out
will help them in any way to understand the nature of literary language?
The poem is asserting that it is attempting to help students, but that is in fact nothing but a pretense. Telling students to
drop a mouse into a poem
and watch him probe his way out
is in fact doing little other than asserting how "clever" and "sensitive" the speaker is and asking the reader to agree that the speaker is clever and sensitive. Isn't that, as I say in my poem, an ego trip?
The poem is also attacking the notion that a poem can be a good poem and be difficult:
They begin beating it with a hose
to find out what it really means.
Collins' poem is little other than propaganda for himself and for the kind of non difficult poetry he writes.
Poetry as ego trip is often very popular--a good deal of Charles Bukowski is like that, though Bukowski is a better poet than Collins. But both Collins and Bukowski often tell you what wonderful people they are, and if we give our assent to the poem, then we get to share in that feeling: we can feel superior and wonderful, too: because we "like" them, we are them--our "liking" them means we are "like" them.
All this is the opposite of what Rilke (or the statue) meant when he (it) said, "Du mußt dein Leben ändern." Note the "du" form--what you would use for children or dogs. Or for intimacy.
*
Archaïscher Torso Apollos
Wir kannten nicht sein unerhörtes Haupt,
darin die Augenäpfel reiften. Aber
sein Torso glüht noch wie ein Kandelaber,
in dem sein Schauen, nur zurückgeschraubt,
sich hält und glänzt. Sonst könnte nicht der Bug
der Brust dich blenden, und im leisen Drehen
der Lenden könnte nicht ein Lächeln gehen
zu jener Mitte, die die Zeugung trug.
Sonst stünde dieser Stein entstellt und kurz
unter der Schultern durchsichtigem Sturz
und flimmerte nicht so wie Raubtierfelle;
und bräche nicht aus allen seinen Rändern
aus wie ein Stern: denn da ist keine Stelle,
die dich nicht sieht. Du mußt dein Leben ändern.
Rainer Maria Rilke
1908
ARCHAIC TORSO OF APOLLO
We cannot know his legendary head
with eyes like ripening fruit. And yet his torso
is still suffused with brilliance from inside,
like a lamp, in which his gaze, now turned to low,
gleams in all its power. Otherwise
the curved breast could not dazzle you so, nor could
a smile run through the placid hips and thighs
to that dark center where procreation flared.
Otherwise this stone would seem defaced
beneath the translucent cascade of the shoulders
and would not glisten like a wild beast's fur:
would not, from all the borders of itself,
burst like a star: for here there is no place
that does not see you. You must change your life.
Translated by Stephen Mitchell |
Michael Virga
New member
Username: Michael_mv
Post Number: 270
Registered: 03-2010
| | Posted on Friday, April 15, 2011 - 12:35 am: |
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Jack,
Happy National Poetry Month to you & Adelle.
I've heard Collins read his poem, and now I hear your voice weaving through - like a subtext.
Thanks for sharing this, esp now @ NPM.
"I want them to waterski"
^^ there's that capital ego "I"
(that's why ee cummings went lower case "i")
following your lead here Jack:
I want them to waterski
the poem encourages them
to waterski its surface
Time to surface Keats' negative capability,
and Archibald MacLeish's:
"A poem should not mean
But be."
Lord, make me an instrument of your poem  Michael (MV) |
Jack Foley
New member
Username: Foley
Post Number: 125
Registered: 01-2010
| | Posted on Sunday, April 17, 2011 - 05:08 pm: |
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Thank you, Michael.
You make a number of good points here--and I'm in agreement with all of them.
Yes, Keats' "Negative Capability" is relevant here, though Collins is far from being "The Egotistical Sublime." Egotistical, yes; sublime, no.
In any case, if you are looking for "an introduction to poetry," Rilke's poem does a lot better than Collins'.
Several people wrote to me thanking me for these remarks about Collins' poem; no disagreements--except that John Bennett knocked me off his poetry list!
Happy Easter! |
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