Litmosphere - Text and Glossary of Poetry by Marianne Moore

 Poetry

Marianne Moore (1887-1972)

I too, dislike it: there are things that are important beyond all this fiddle.
   Reading it, however, with a perfect contempt for it, one discovers that there is in
   it after all, a place for the genuine.
      Hands that can grasp, eyes
      that can dilate, hair that can rise
         if it must, these things are important not because a

high-sounding interpretation can be put upon them but because they are
   useful; when they become so derivative as to become unintelligible, the
   same thing may be said for all of us—that we
      do not admire what
      we cannot understand. The bat,
         holding on upside down or in quest of something to

eat, elephants pushing, a wild horse taking a roll, a tireless wolf under
   a tree, the immovable critic twinkling his skin like a horse that feels a flea, the base—
   ball fan, the statistician—case after case
      could be cited did
      one wish it; nor is it valid
         to discriminate against “business documents and

school-books”; all these phenomena are important. One must make a distinction
   however: when dragged into prominence by half poets, the result is not poetry,
   nor till the autocrats among us can be
     “literalists of
      the imagination”—above
         insolence and triviality and can present

for inspection, imaginary gardens with real toads in them, shall we have
   it. In the meantime, if you demand on the one hand, in defiance of their opinion—
   the raw material of poetry in
      all its rawness, and
      that which is on the other hand,
         genuine, then you are interested in poetry.

Glossary

Fiddle: the noun fiddle has three implications here. The first is, fiddle is a musical instrument which evokes pleasure. Poetry too is like fiddle which pleases its readers. Second is, fiddle refers to fidgeting with something in a restless way. The process of writing a poem involves a lot of fidgeting. Thirdly, fiddle also refers to small sum; in this sense the speaker refers to poetry as something worthless.

Line 4-6: The speaker describes various physical responses poetry is capable of producing such as hands grasping, eyes dilating and hair rising.

high-sounding interpretation: this refers to criticism which often present literature in high sounding interpretation.

Line 11-19: the speaker offers a detailed list of raw materials which can poetry.

literalist of the imagination: this phrase is drawn from of W B Yeats' remarks about William Blakes. A literalist uses language to create a lifelike object in the readers imagination. Similarly. A poet is a literalist of imagination who stirs the imagination through precise, evocative imagery.

Imaginary gardens with real toads in them: the speaker states genuine poets are capable of creating imaginary gardens in the mind of readers with real -producing effects of the real-toads in it.

Line 26-30: the speaker of the poem reaffirms that the two ingredients for real poetry is genuine raw materials, that is genuine language and form.