Part 8, cont - Fictive Certainties, Cognition and Thought

COGNITION AND THOUGHT

The third section of The Art of Reading Poetry addresses the greatness of poetry depending on figurative language that works "cognitive power", citing the Emerson quote that poetry is "meter-making argument", that poetry "represents thought" (not to be confused with "thoughts"). It was this section that helped me to see what was missing from Voigt's outlining of the parts of poetry in "The Flexible Lyric."

When I began reading Duncan’s "The Truth and Life of Myth" I immediately realized that what I had read about the parts of poetry was incomplete. It was not until I re-read this section of The Art of Reading Poetry that I was able to articulate what the missing parts were. The third section of The Art of Reading Poetry echoes a section of "Ideas of the Meaning of Form."