我要他们拿一首诗
高高举起至光亮
象个彩色幻灯片

或把一只耳朵紧靠它的蜂房。

我说将一只老鼠投入诗
并注视它探查它的出路，

或行走于诗歌房子内
感觉墙壁寻找灯开关。

我要它们滑水
跃过一首诗的表面
向岸上作者名字挥手。

但所有他们想做的是
用绳子将诗捆绑在椅子上
并严刑拷打使之招供。

他们开始用软管打它
以找出其真实内涵。

Introduction to Poetry

I ask them to take a poem
and hold it up to the light
like a color slide
or press an ear against its hive.
I say drop a mouse into a poem
and watch him probe his way out,
or walk inside the poem's room
and feel the walls for a light switch.
I want them to waterski
across the surface of a poem
waving at the author's name on the shore.
But all they want to do
is tie the poem to a chair with rope
and torture a confession out of it.
They begin beating it with a hose
to find out what it really means.

--Billy Collins