Poetry on the Brain

Most nights at 7:00 p.m. find us watching The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer on our local public television channel. On New Year’s Eve, Jeffrey Brown interviewed John Ashbery, a prodigious and prize winning current American poet. What particularly interested me was that apparently there are a large number of people who consider Ashbery’s poetry rather difficult to read and understand. Indeed, when some of his poetry was being read aloud, it seemed a bit incomprehensible to me, although in looking over printed versions I found his poetry easier to understand with the words in front of me.

Later that evening at serendip, I came upon a poem about the brain by Emily Dickinson, an American poet from the 1800s. Her poem, short and simple, inspired me to do a search for ‘poems about the brain’.

One of the first items that turned up was Verse broadens the mind, the scientists find, according to the article of the same name at the April 2005 Scotsman.com site. Essentially, reading poetry requires more eye movement, and greater eye movement relates to deeper thought. Apparently, trying to decipher the meaning of poetry, for instance, reading lines several times over to make meaning, turns out to be healthy exercise for our cortical muscle. From my experience with Ashbery’s poetry, reading was the crucial factor in my understanding. Listening without written words to follow only led me to confusion. The researchers interviewed for the article also commented on the use of rhyme as an aid for memory, as well as children’s innate love of rhyme that seems to get squashed by the time the children become young adults.

Of course, my search also led me to Neuroscience for Kids – Writing Projects, where, of the 28 enertaining suggestions for writing related to the brain, the first project is brain limericks.

And so I share with you Emily Dickinson’s poem, taken from 42opus, ‘an online magazine of the literary arts’, and then leave you to your own poetic ponderings.

The Brain–is wider than the Sky–
by Emily Dickinson

The Brain–is wider than the Sky–
For–put them side by side–
The one the other will contain
With ease–and You–beside–

The Brain is deeper than the sea–
For–hold them–Blue to Blue–
The one the other will absorb–
As Sponges–Buckets–do–

The Brain is just the weight of God–
For–Heft them–Pound for Pound–
And they will differ–if they do–
As Syllable from Sound–