HFCC Learning Lab
Creative Writing, 9.23
Analyzing Poetry
One idea that students find very hard to disabuse themselves of is that anything set down on a
page so as to look like poetry is therefore poetry. The writing of poetry is both an art and a craft; it is not
simply the spilling of emotions onto paper.
Another troublesome misapprehension in creative writing classes is the belief that a poem (or
story, for that matter) means simply what the reader takes it to mean. There is always intention behind
any piece of writing. The writer may not live up to his intention (writing a bad poem or a poor short
story), but this does not leave the reader free to read meanings into the work that were not intended.
This is not to say that only one interpretation of a work is possible; there is always a range of
interpretation. Any interpretation must, however, be supported by what is on the page.
Here are a few questions that should be useful in our working with students’ poems:
-What is the “prose sense” of the poem, the central idea expressed in a prose statement?
-What does each stanza contribute to the central idea? Can you give a prose paraphrase of each
stanza and show how each relates to the development of the whole?
-What is the tone of the poem? Is it serious and weighty? Playful? Cynical? How is the tone
indicated by the diction? Meter? Rhyme? Rhythm? Stanza form? Incident and imagery?
-What is the theme of the poem?
-What is the form of the poem-sonnet, ballad, dramatic monolog, and so on? How suitable is the
form to the subject, theme, and tone?
-Aside from its overall structure or form, what material qualities does the poem have? Is there
anything special to be said about its rhythm, meter, and rhyme? Does it use any special devices
such as alliteration, onomatopoeia, or special typographical devices?
-What kind of diction and imagery does the poem use? Is its diction poetic, colloquial, prosaic? Is
there much metaphor or little? Are there few or many literary, historical, or mythological
references; allusions to contemporary ideas, media, or events?
-What is the poem’s purpose or intention? As far as you can tell from your analysis of the poem
up to this point, is this intention conscious and explicit or unconscious and implicit? In other
words, how obvious is the poem, or how subtle?
6/23/2010