Billy Collins Rides Again!

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Dear Everyone:

A cheerful and upbeat poem today, by (former, I think) American poet laureate Billy Collins. He read a poem whose first lines he liked, but not the way the poem developed. So he borrowed those lines, and restarted the poem. As follows:

Litany
by Billy Collins

You are the bread and the knife,
the crystal goblet and the wine.
You are the dew on the morning grass
and the burning wheel of the sun.
You are the white apron of the baker

[Rest of poem removed because it’s still in copyright]


Cool, huh? This poem (as if you needed to be told) is an exploration of metaphor. And what is the difference between simile and metaphor, boys and girls? Right. A simile is a metaphor using the words “like” or “as” and a metaphor is a direct comparison. So if you say that the president brays like a donkey, that’s a simile. If you say he is an ass, that’s a metaphor.

End of lesson.

Nonpolitically yours,
Michael

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