Poetry from Daily Life: Muhammad Ali could float like a butterfly. Your poem can, too.
Creating Connection Through Metaphor
Let us start with a little poetry joke, shall we?Q: What did the poet say to Luke Skywalker?
A: Metaphors be with you!
As a poet by profession as well as avocation, I have adopted this punchline as the guiding mantra for my life. “Metaphors be with you” is a poet’s way of saying namaste, shalom, or peace out! But to me, it is more than just a clever play on words. I believe that people who see the world through the lens of metaphor are more in tune with the interconnectedness of things.
The two magic ingredients of metaphor are connection and comparison. Poets see ways of connecting things that are traditionally unconnected. A boxer is not a butterfly. A boxer is not a bee. But a boxer can certainly float. And a boxer can certainly sting. No one would ever mistake Muhammad Ali for a butterfly or a honeybee. And yet poetry uses metaphor to show us how they are connected and what they have in common.
Try it yourself. Practice walking through your world in search of metaphorical connections. How can the tree in your yard be an old man? How can the toaster on your kitchen counter be a hungry volcano? Bonus points for making personal connections. For example, what do you have in common with that tree growing in your yard or that toaster waiting on your kitchen counter? How are you like the bookshelf in your living room? Do you hold knowledge, too? Are you sturdy, tall, deep, or dusty?
Try keeping a list of all the connections that you find. Maybe even turn one or two of them into a poem. My poem, “Metaphors,” compares a poem to sparkling fireworks, a loud rocket, a quiet bloom, and a secret room. I even compare a poem to myself.
So, what are you waiting for? Start looking for the many connections that make up your world. And metaphors be with you!
Metaphors
A poem can be a rocket (zoom!)
that I can ride beyond the sky.
A poem can be a secret room
where I can watch the world walk by.
∘
A poem can be bright fireworks (boom!),
all whoosh and zing and sparkling fun.
A poem can be a quiet bloom
who turns her face to drink the sun.
∘
A poem can be a mountain ridge
that lifts me to a wider view.
A poem can be a sturdy bridge
that leads the way from me to you.
∘
A poem can be a zoom, a room,
a bloom, a bridge, a boom, a zing.
A poem can be just like me, too.
We both can be so many things.
This post originally appeared as a guest column for Poetry in Daily Life in the Springfield News Leader.
