And the poem, I think, is only your voice speaking.
The poet can only write the poems; it takes the reader to complete the meaning.
I learn a lot about my poems when I read them by the way people respond to them.
Baudelaire's L'Héautontimorouménos was long seen to be a sexual sadomasochistic poem, it is now generally accepted that the poem is about writing poetry.
If you read quickly to get through a poem to what it means, you have missed the body of the poem.
Readers bring their own experiences, their own range of - their own wisdom, their own knowledge, their own insights to poem and the meaning of a poem takes place in the negotiation between the poet, the poem and the reader.
What is the poem, after it is written? That is the question. Not where it came from or why.
Poems have ideas. The ideas of poems come out of their emotions and their emotions are carried on images.
Once an author finishes a poem, he becomes merely another reader. I may remember what I intended to put into a text, but what matters is what a reader actually finds there which is usually something both more and less than the poet planned.
I want to reiterate that my understanding of the poem is not the poem's core, true meaning. Once a poem goes out into the world, the poet is just one more reader.
