Alex Sutton
Poetry Composition essay
Hesseltine
2/27/15

Prompt: The Power within poetry inspires the reader to create meaning and beauty for oneself.

In “Introduction to poetry” and “On First Looking Into Chapman’s Homer” both want to spark a fire of a deeper level of understanding, beauty, and fun. In Collins’s poem the feeling of thinking about the meaning of the poem combines with the idea of poems don’t necessarily obligated to be a task but could be a pleasant and enjoyable surprise. “I want them to waterski across the surface of a poem / waving at the author’s name on the shore.” By saying that he wants them to waterski means that he wants his readers to have fun with reading the poem. I also think that when Collins says that he wants them to wave at the author’s name on the shore, it means that the author won’t be there while you read the poem to tell you exactly what things mean. Rather, you will have to decipher the true meaning - by yourself. But the harsh reality is that most readers want to pluck apart a poem to find what they think is the “right meaning” and that most readers today find poetry as a requirement rather than a desire. The cause for the poem is that Collins wants us to unearth our interpretation of the meaning, beauty, and entertainment of the poem.
In “On First Looking Into Chapman’s Homer” Keats wants us to find our own insight and motivation from the power of poetry. Throughout the poem Keats brings us back to this idea of wonder and charm that can be revealed through poetry. In lines 11-14 Keats shows us his emotions upon first reading Chapman’s Homer “Or like stout Cortez, when with eagle eyes
He star’d at the