Waxing Poetic

“A good poem is a contribution to reality. The world is never the same once a good poem has been added to it. A good poem helps to change the shape of the universe, helps to extend everyone’s knowledge of himself and the world around him.”

—Dylan Thomas

As I was reading a very old poem to a group of high school seniors a few days ago, I was struck—delighted really—by how engaged they were with both my reading of the poem and seemingly with the poem itself. Imagine, if you will, twenty-four 17-year-olds, eyes bright and attentive, all watching and listening as I stand in front of them passionately reading a 200-year old poem that, despite my best efforts to dismiss categorically for so many reasons, I literally fall in love with every time I read. By the end of my reading of the poem, my students understand that their tall, goofy, loving English teacher really loves this poem. I mean really. I reread the beautiful lines, exclaim at the elegance of the language, sigh at the tone and finally, invite them to tell me how it makes them feel. What do they think? No wrong answers—only how this poem makes them feel. One student tells me she likes it because it reminds her of something and another because he totally knows that feeling the speaker has. They raise their hands and tell me which lines they really like, which images pop out to them. They speculate about what the poem means, who might be speaking, what he is really trying to say. They get comfortable with asking questions that can’t be answered and with the ambiguity of the meaning of the poem. One students says she love this poem, another that she doesn’t; and many say it’s just okay, but they all engage in one way or another.

Afterward, they work with a partner to discuss and analyze the poem, while I try to be inconspicuous at my desk, classical music playing softly, and listen in on their thoughtful conversations about the poem. It is one of those teacher moments that really defies description and as I sit here, I feel not only this profound joy to see them use our tools of analysis to engage with this poem, but also this enormous responsibility because, I am their last-stop English teacher in high school and possibly the very last person who will try to sell them on the profound importance of poetry in the world. 

The next day, my plan is to bring my students back together and “unpack” the poem, using their annotations—and enthusiasm—from the day before. My idea is to spend 20 good minutes doing this and then move on to another, more contemporary—and perhaps, more socially exigent—poem. But alas, they are not having it. They literally will not stop talking about William Wordsworth’s, “I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud” and hand after hand goes up to share eloquent insights about the resonating value of nature and the role of memory and solitude and the use of natural imagery and the power of personification. Finally, 50 minutes later, I stop them and ask this simple question: Do you like this poem more, less or the same after analyzing it? Every single student agrees that they like the poem a lot more after examining it more closely. 

And, voila, my students have compelling evidence that taking a thing apart, looking closely at its elements through the lens of critical analysis and talking about it with language that was built for just that purpose, can actually make the thing better—more interesting—more enjoyable. My students feel engaged and successful and I know that it is my job going forward to build on this confidence and to help them hone these critical skills and to show them how they can be used not only to better understand literary works, but also just about everything else in the world.

I’m not going to lie, to me this seems like pretty important work, but even more important—and this is the part I try never to forget—it is also my job to help them feel the extraordinary power of poems. How a poem can land in their souls and never leave. How a good poem can make the hair on their arms stand up and their hearts race and their chests fill with warmth. How a poem can make them smile or weep or see the world in a whole new light.

From poems, they learn about language in its sparest, most concentrated form. Poems boil down ideas to their very essence and students often connect to the power and simplicity of this idea. As they begin to understand how poets reimagine syntax and play with diction to describe the most common things in completely new and original ways, they begin to understand why people write. And, this is how poetry can be a bridge to writing instruction. As we examine how poets both follow and break our rules of language, students begin to understand those rules a little better. At a time when my 12th grade students are stressed out about SATs and college applications, poetry is a reminder that being present in the world and attentive to its splendors is also important and that every question doesn’t have to have a correct answer. Reading and discussing student poetry in class not only helps students to lean into their creativity, it also helps them to become stronger speakers and listeners, and when done right, it can help cultivate community in the classroom and foster the best human attributes of all—kindness and empathy.

I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud

by William Wordsworth

I wandered lonely as a cloud
That floats on high o'er vales and hills,
When all at once I saw a crowd,
A host of golden daffodils;
Beside the lake, beneath the trees,
Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.

Continuous as the stars that shine
and twinkle on the Milky Way,
They stretched in never-ending line
along the margin of a bay:
Ten thousand saw I at a glance,
tossing their heads in sprightly dance.

The waves beside them danced; but they
Out-did the sparkling waves in glee:
A poet could not but be gay,
in such a jocund company:
I gazed—and gazed—but little thought
what wealth the show to me had brought:

For oft, when on my couch I lie
In vacant or in pensive mood,
They flash upon that inward eye
Which is the bliss of solitude;
And then my heart with pleasure fills,
And dances with the daffodils.