First Impressions of Billy Collins: "The Art of Drowning"

This week, I'm reading "The Art of Drowning" by Billy Collins. Billy Collins is a well-known poet even to those not well-acquainted with poetry. Collins' poetry is almost the antithesis of the poetry volume I read last week by McGuckian--while I felt that McGuckian made attempts to be purposefully vague and complicated, Collins goes out of his way to make his poetry clear and accessible to the reader. At times, I felt that Collins' poetry was almost too accessible to the lay reader: the themes/imagery are obvious, bordering on trite. For example, "Days":

Each one is a gift, no doubt,
mysteriously placed in your waking hand
or set upon your forehead
moments before you open your eyes.

It doesn't take a lot of analysis or deep, introspective thought to figure out what these four lines are saying: we should treat each individual day with care because there might not be another. Little things, like the italicized "is" seem too obvious: couldn't he have let the reader add that emphasis? Here's the whole poem:

Each one is a gift, no doubt,
mysteriously placed in your waking hand
or set upon your forehead
moments before you open your eyes.

Today begins cold and bright,
the ground heavy with snow
and the thick masonry of ice,
the sun glinting off the turrets of clouds.

Through the calm eye of the window
everything is in its place
but so precariously
this day might be resting somehow

on the one before it,
all the days of the past stacked high
like the impossible tower of dishes
entertainers used to build on stage.

No wonder you find yourself
perched on the top of a tall ladder
hoping to add one more.
Just another Wednesday

you whisper,
then holding your breath,
place this cup on yesterday's saucer
without the slightest clink.

Some of the imagery that Collins uses to describe the passage of time seems rather dull: sun, clouds, window, ladder, etc. None of these images jump out as really painting a fresh picture. Other images, like the one in the last stanza, are much more effective because they are a little less spelled out. In general, I think that poets need to strike a balance between spelling out their imagery for the reader and obscuring it--if it's not quite lucid (but will become so with some thought on behalf of the reader) then the poet has down his or her job: making the reader THINK.

Stephen Dunn, another poet, said about Collins: "We seem to always know where we are in a Billy Collins poem, but not necessarily where he is going. I love to arrive with him at his arrivals. He doesn't hide things from us, as I think lesser poets do. He allows us to overhear, clearly, what he himself has discovered." I think that this is an accurate read on Collins' poetry; however, at least from his poems that I have read so far, I feel that his occasion/intention/message in general are sometimes too clear on the first read-through. His poetry just doesn't provoke the meditation and deep thought that some of the other volumes that I've read do.