How to Eat a Poem
Purpose: When reading poetry, students so often feel pressure to find the “deeper” or “underlying” meaning. This exercise is meant to demonstrate that they can read poetry and get meaning from it, and that they don’t need to feel pressure about it.
Description: This exercise provides one way for students to “eat” a poem, meaning to digest a meaning from a poem for themselves. Basically, you’ll choose a contemporary poem and explain how to read a poem, then have students read according to that protocol.
Suggested Time: 35-50 Minutes
Procedure:
Step 1: Prepare for Lesson
For this lesson, you’ll need to pick out a poem to read to the class. I recommend picking out something contemporary that easily connects with students. Examples of this could be Tony Hoagland’s “Poor Britney Spears,” Kim Addonizio’s “First Poem for You,” Matthew Dickman’s “V,” Dorriane Laux’s “Facts about the Moon,” or Sherman Alexie’s “Heroes.” Obviously these are just examples -- there are tons more out there. The point is not to pick something too archaic or hard to understand; rather, choose poetry that is contemporary and digestible.
Make copies of the poem so that each student has one to read in class. Make sure that students have writing utensils ready.
Step 2: Dispell the Myth of the “Underlying Meaning”
To start this exercise you’ll need to give a brief talk or have them read something that dispels a myth that has been instilled in many young adults, the myth that poetry has some “hidden meaning.” Here’s an example of what I tell my students:
People often offer me this complaint when I talk to them about poetry: ‘I don’t understand poetry. Why do poets hide meaning? I wish they would just say what they mean!” Perhaps you’ve thought this (I did when I was in college).
But thinking that poets are trying to “hide” their meaning is misleading, and hiding meaning is not what poetry is about. If the best poets could hide their meaning the most, then the “best” poetry would be unreadable to anybody else. Instead, poetry is more exact in meaning than prose or plain speech.
Let me explain: if I say “I love you,” you have some vague idea of what I mean. But I’ve said that phrase to my parents, sister, brother, ex-girlfriends, former classes I taught, pet bird, favorite book, etc. The phrase has little meaning on its own. Sometimes it means “I want to get in your pants;” others it means “I commit my life to you,” or “you birthed me, that was pretty cool,” “I grew up with you and we are linked that way forever,” “you were the best classroom I‘ve taught,” “you whistle the Mardi Gras Mambo, that’s pretty cool.”
What I’ve just done is made my language more specific to its audience and to the rhetorical situation. Poetry is that magnified times 10 -- it is the most specific form of expression. Sure, there are many kinds of poetry, some easier and some harder to understand. Sometimes you will be able to verbalize a meaning, and sometimes you won’t, and that’s okay. Sometimes, maybe, you’ll feel like you know what the poem means, but won’t be able to describe it. But what makes poetry hard to understand is that you are zooming in to unpack the specific meaning of each word when you read it.
Step 3: Instruct Students on How to Read a Poem, They Read Chosen Poem
Read the poem first with your pen down. Read at a moderate pace -- slow enough to enjoy the language, but fast enough to follow the meaning of the sentences.
As you read the first time, try to play a video in your head of the images in the poem. Reading a poem should be like experiencing your own personal movie. This may not work for the entire poem, but do it as much as possible.
Reread the poem, this time with a pen in your hand. Underline your favorite images, and make a short note about why you connect with them. Put a star next to any parts you don’t understand.
Also, on this second read think about the tone of the poem as you read. Is the poem traumatic? Hilarious? Is the speaker yelling at you? whispering? Try to see if you can hear those things in your head.
Finally, let the poem affect you and write down how it makes you feel. Allow yourself to be moved, or to take something from the poem, or even to get angry with the poem. This requires letting your guard down and believing that a poem can do this. People have different “readings” of poems/literature - some will find the same poem offensive as another might find beautiful.
Step 4: Class Discussion of the Poem
Have a conversation about the poem with the students. Make sure to have the conversation on the student’s terms -- this means you should start by asking them what the poem meant to them, what images or lines they particularly enjoyed, or what video they saw in their heads while reading.
As you discuss with them, be sure to ask about the poem’s rhetorical situation, the audience of the poem, etc.
Also, be sure to ask them about the process of reading -- did it work for them? Did it not? Why or why not?