Task 4

 ‘Ars Poetica’ by Archibald MacLeish:

A poem should be papable and mute
As a globed fruit,

Dumb,
As old medallions to the thumb,

Silent as the sleeve-worn stone
Of casement ledges where the moss has grown -

A poem should be wordless
As the flight of birds

So: 1)  write an interpretation of the stanza and post it to your group blog: 2) comment on someone else’s post showing what you think they have had to add or remove from the content of the stanza in order to make it make sense.

Task 4

I had to take this section by section and looked up the meanings of a few of the words to see if I could grasp what the poet was trying to say.

I think overall this poem highlights the effect that a poem should have an individual the qualities it should possess if it is to have the power it should do as a piece of art. 

The opening lines convey this with use of the word palpable, implying that a poem is more than just words on paper, but a means to communicate with the reader and evoke some feeling inside of them possibly even rendering them speechless, either through feeling or need to reflect on the true meaning behind each word.  

I think this is highlighted again through the use of the word dumb which can also mean that an individual is overwhelmed to the point that they are unable to speak.  

This line ‘old medallions to the thumb’ possibly refers to some kind of coin, and if you rubbed your thumb over the coin you can feel what’s on the surface no words are needed for this you simply understand it’s a coin from the feeling of it in this act of feeling you could also differentiate between something that is real or fake, so a reader can tell a poem is good due to the emotion it evokes when being read. 

His use of similes continues throughout the poem I believe it is there to produce an image within our minds, making it easier for us to get the meaning of his words through more than one of our senses. 

The poem does seem to contradict itself by implying that ‘a poem should be wordless’ which we know to be impossible but again I think this is MacLeish’s way of trying to incite imagery helping us understand that with a genuine piece of art, even when the words are gone, the ideas of that piece work still resonate within our minds and even our hearts.