In the first two lines Collins is frustrated with his poetry class. Presumably, he is the teacher of this class, and despite his suggestions on what to do with the poem his students are not listening to him. His first request is that the students use the poem like a “color slide” (2). This is the first of many words he uses that has connotations; feelings or actions associated with them. The message he is sending to the reader is that the naked eye cannot grasp the poem’s intentions; the mind must help too, like the “light” which the color slide has to be held up to. The reader has to look through the words to find the meaning, like a person l

“But all they want to do” (12) is the first of the five remaining lines in the poem. Now, Collins goes back to writing about his class and shows how they have failed to follow his advice. He uses personification as he writes about his students performing actions on the poem only a human could receive. They use violence against the poem and “tie the poem to a chair with rope” (13). He uses this comparison because the students are, in essence, tying up the poem’s freedom, its ability to move around in the their minds, and its power to shift and to change. They concentrate too much on the written rules of analyzing poetry; the outlines, checklists, and long packets of “how to” and “what to”. And not only do the students suppress the poem’s freedom; they also “torture a confession out of it” (14). Like the last phrase, this one is not meant to be taken literally either; there is no waving around of a pen and brandishing of a pair of scissors. What Collins really means is that his students try to force a meaning out the poem instead of letting the meaning come to them. Beating the poem with a hose is another way or showing that the students are full of aggressions and anger towards the poem, most likely caused by their frustration. They are filled with the urge to rush through the poem and they panic at the idea of not finding the message soon enough. These are the very feelings Collins wants his students to avoid and he shows their frustration to the reader by giving the poem human characteristics.

On the surface, Billy Col

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