Analyzing Poetry

I just discovered that I’m not at all bad at analyzing poetry. If the enjoyment of the activity is any sort of an indicator (and with me it usually is), then I might actually be quite good.

I always thought I’d suck at poetry, so I never tried it. But a book titled Literature of the Crisis would look freaky if it pointedly excluded poetry just because I’m scared of it.

So I started analyzing a poem, and it turns out I have a lot to say about it. And I recognize the poems this poet makes use of because it turns out I have read quite a lot of poetry and am not as unprepared as I thought I was to analyze it. 

I blame my teachers for this terror of poetry that I used to feel. They made me believe that analyzing poetry was too hard and too useless and not to be attempted. It turns out, however, that if you really love a poem (and have had training in literary analysis), you will be able to say quite a lot about it. 

This whole awakening to poetry is a result of my interactions with one of my students. He’s been analyzing poetry in every essay he ever handed in to me and was doing a kick-ass job. And as I was discussing his work with him, I kind of got into the whole thing and decided to continue it on my own. I’m just happy that I didn’t turn out to be one of those professors who imbue students with the fear of poetry. I mean, I almost did but this student resisted me. And I’m very happy he did.

OK, I’ll stop gushing now and go analyze me some more poetry.