Let's look at an example. If a poet wanted to describe a pregnant woman, instead of saying simply that she is expecting, the poet might say: The woman's belly swelled with life.

From this line you see that the poet has found a more descriptive way of saying the obvious. Her belly is large like that of a pregnant woman. It is large because life (a baby) is growing inside. Not as difficult as it seems, right?

In fact, reading poetry doesn't have to be as tedious and complicated as you think. Once you come up with a few simple steps and ideas in your mind, reading a poem might actually become quite enjoyable.

So what are these steps?

First, you must identify the basics:

Who's the speaker?

What's the subject?

Second, to understand poetry you must read it aloud.

Think of poetry as you would music in that both rely on rhythm and patterns to create meaning. Like a song, you should listen to the whole poem once without interruption. Then go back and try to make sense out of the individual lines.

Students often misunderstand poems because they've read them incorrectly. Pausing in the right places is important in getting the meaning. Pause where it feels natural or when you see punctuation, and not necessarily wherever the line stops. If English isn't your native language, ask your teacher or a native English speaker to read the poem aloud.

Lastly, think of a poem as a small story in which every line and word is related to a single idea. The poem itself is like a picture of a single event or moment in time.

Let's look at a sample poem.

The Turtle

By Mary Oliver

breaks from the blue-black

skin of the water, dragging her shell ...

to the yellow sand,

to dig with her ungainly feet

a nest ...

and you think

of her patience, her fortitude

her determination to complete

what she was born to do -

and then you realise a greater thing -

she doesn't consider

what she was born to do.

She's only filled

with an old, blind wish ...

She can't see

herself apart from the rest of the world

or the world from what she must do

every spring.

Dream Work. Atlantic Monthly Press, New York. 1986.

Now apply the steps listed above to this poem.

Exercise 1:

1. First, cover the basics. What/who is the subject of this poem?

2. What clues or details help you determine the subject?

3. Who do you think the speaker is? Is it someone specific or could it be anyone in general?

4. What is happening in this poem?

Exercise 2:

1. When reading the poem aloud, should the reader pause at the end of every line or where there is punctuation?

2. The speaker of the poem has a realisation. What is that realisation and why is it important?

3. Why is the turtle described as patient? What about her fortitude?

4. The turtle is described as being filled with an 'old blind wish'. What do you think this metaphor means?

Answers:

Exercise 1

1. The turtle

2. The title, the description of the shell, the fact that she is laying eggs

3. Speaker could be anyone

4. The turtle is laying/hatching her eggs

Exercise 2

1. Where there is punctuation

2. Speaker realises that the turtle, unlike humans, doesn't think of itself selfishly but just acts naturally without thought