IMAGES

If someone asked you what is the single most important aspect of poetry, you might be tempted to say, "rhythm" or "rhyme." But these things are really not the basic ingredient of poetry. As long ago as the sixteenth century, Sir Philip Sidney said in his treatise on poetry that the only thing you really need for a poem is imagery.

Yes, images are the basic ingredient of a poem. Without images there can be no poem.

Consider, for example, the following poem:

          Anger is

          The only reason that

          Love is necessary.

Nice sentiment? Yes, but no poetry here. All the words are "idea" words. There is not a concrete image anywhere in the poem. Now consider the following variation on the previous attempt at a poem:

The red moth  Disembowels the dahlia  Because cream is soft and sweet.

Well, it's not Shakespeare, but it's poetry. So what is "imagery" anyway? An image is a PICTURE, something that makes an impression on your brain. Read the following words slowly:

1. Elephant

2. Apple pie

3. White Diamonds

4. Fingernails on a blackboard

5. Velvet

Each of these words evoked in your brain an IMAGE. If the experiment worked correctly, in fact, your brain was titillated in FIVE different ways because there are FIVE different kinds of images, corresponding to the five senses. We react to:

Imagery can be VISUAL, AUDITORY, OLFACTORY, GUSTATORY, or TACTILE. Most imagery, however, is visual. About 90% of it. But you should be aware of the other four kinds of images when they are at work in a poem. Can you match the type of imagery with the list of five given above? ["White Diamonds" is the name of a perfume that Elizabeth Taylor hawks.]

In the following lines from Keats' "Ode on the Eve of St. Agnes" see if you can discriminate various kinds of imagery:

          And still she slept an azure-lidded sleep,

          In blanched linen, smooth, and lavendered,

          While he from forth the closet broupt a heap

          Of candied apple, quince, and plum, and gourd;

          With jellies soother than the creamy curd,

          And lucent syrups, tinct with cinnamon;

          Manna and dates, in argosy transferred

          From Fez, and spiced dainties, every one,

          From silken Samarcand to cedared Lebanon.   

Do you agree that the following words convey gustatory images?

          And still she slept an azure-lidded sleep,

          In blanched linen, smooth, and lavendered,

          While he from forth the closet broupt a heap

          Of candied apple, quince, and plum, and gourd;

          With jellies soother than the creamy curd,

          And lucent syrups, tinct with cinnamon;

          Manna and dates, in argosy transferred

          From Fez, and spiced dainties, every one,

          From silken Samarcand to cedared Lebanon.

And would you agree that the following words evoke olfactory images?

          And still she slept an azure-lidded sleep,

          In blanched linen, smooth, and lavendered,

          While he from forth the closet brought a heap

          Of candied apple, quince, and plum, and gourd;

          With jellies soother than the creamy curd,

          And lucent syrups, tinct with cinnamon;

          Manna and dates, in argosy transferred

          From Fez, and spiced dainties, every one,

          From silken Samarcand to cedared Lebanon.

Of course some words evoke multiple images: you can both taste and smell "cinnamon," and you can both smell and see "lavender."

Return to poetics menu.

Walt Whitman's shoes in the parlor on Mickle Street in Camden, New Jersey, where the poet lived the last years of his life.