The Pleasures of Poetry

Poetry is the history of the human heart

When I stumbled upon an antique book of collected poems by Yeats as a child, I could hardly understand its contextual basis, although, I was familiar with his poetry due to our school coursework.

I found that book too dry and it made no sense back then. Slowly though, I could make myself more used to poetry, enjoy it and a few months back I was watching a masterclass by American Poet Billy Collins in which he describes the pleasures of poetry. They are:

• Pleasures of dance– the pleasure that one experiences due to the rhythms of the poem
• Pleasures of sound– some may define poetry as words that mean more in sound 
• Pleasures of travel– it is the pleasure of moving from one place in the poem to a different place
• Pleasures of metaphorical connections– coming up with wild connections in a poem is in itself very pleasurable
• Pleasures of companionship-the pleasure that comes from memorization of a poem