Guide to Reading Poetry

1. READ the poem silently to determine that the speaker is seeing, feeling, doing, or saying.

2. IDENTIFY the listener, if any, and explain the relationship and/or situation of the speaker and listener.

3. EXPLAIN the speaker’s tone. I. A. Richards defines tone as the literary speaker’s “attitude to his listener. . . [the speaker’s] sense of how he stands toward those he is addressing” (Practical Criticism, 1929). “The tone of a speech can be critical or approving, formal or intimate, outspoken or reticent, solemn or playful, arrogant or prayerful, angry or loving, serious or ironic, condescending or obsequious, and so on through numberless possible nuances of relationship and attitude both to object and auditor” (M. H. Abrams, Glossary of Literary Terms, 6^th ed.).

4. READ the poem again noting the points where the tone changes, where the speaker’s attention shifts, or where alterations in points of view (spatial or temporal) occur.

5. IDENTIFY the form of the whole poem (sonnet, ode, lyric, ballad) and its parts (verse paragraphs, stanzas, sentences). Look for the logical or rhetorical devices the poet uses to connect (or separate) one part from another.

6. EXPLAIN the general structure (or development) of the poem by relating poetic divisions or syntax (sentence patterns) to the speaker’s tone and content.

7. READ the poem aloud looking for unusual diction (word choice), striking images, sensory details, figurative language (similes, metaphors, analogies), and changes in rhyme and rhythm.

8. IDENTIFY recurrent patterns, repeated words and phrases, image-clusters (recurrent similes and metaphors), and sound patterns (alliteration, assonance, consonance, rhyme scheme and meter).

9. EXPLAIN the effects on the whole of the regularity or irregularity in the poem’s language or sound of language.

10. Combine your answers to questions of theme, speaker, structure, and language in an analysis of the full text of the poem. Consider your options for presenting what you know. Be logical in your development and economical in manner. Proportion your essay with balance of ideas and evidence. Read your essay aloud to catch infelicities of style, vague references, and limping rhythms. Revise and proofread the final draft carefully.

Or read Billy Collins' poem "Introduction to Poetry" here.