The following excerpt is an interview with the poet Jose Garcia Villa.

In thisinterview, he
is asked to explain "Lyric 17." You should find it very interesting tocompare your
interpretation of each of the seven couplets to the poet's personalinterpretations.
If you find that your interpretations differ from Villa's, do not feel that yourideas were
necessarily incorrect. Note how both the interviewer and the poet admit that it is not an
easy task to give an exact prose interpretation of a poeticexpression, particularly
because poems are not explicitly stated; the interviewer,at one point, admits: "I have
always found the next lines difficult to comprehend":
It must have the wisdom of bows
And it must kneel like a rose.
Focus here on the poet's response: "You must remember," Villa said, "somelines and
some poems cannot be explained. But let me try..."
Once you have finished reading the interview, compare his interpretationswith your own
and with the interpretations made by members of your cooperative group.
The Interview
Villa's lyrical and exquisitely crafted poem,"Lyric 17" (Villa, 1942),can serve as the basis
for discussing his techniques of poetry. Although the poet did not setout to achieve this
end, he does so, gracefullyand economically. As you shall see, this beautiful poem
leads to a unique definition of what apoem should be.
In a taped interview, Villa provided me withan explication of this poem. Of the first
twolines,
First, a poem must be magical
Then musical as a sea-gull.
Villa said, "These lines mean exactly what theysay: That a poem must have magic, and
it mustbe musical."
I asked the poet, "What meaning would youascribe to the next lines?"
It must be a brightness moving
And hold secret a bird's flowering.
Villa explained, "There are some brightnesses which are stationary and static, but a
poem,like a bird, must fly. This is the differencebetween prose and poetry. Prose is
flatfootedand stationary; poetry soars, flies like a bird.The stationary bird, when first
seen, appearslike a rosebud. When it begins to fly, it opensup and spreads its wings
and blooms like aflower."
I asked him to explain the images in the fifthand sixth lines,
It must be slender as a bell
And it must hold fire as well.
To these lines, Villa responded, "A poem is economical; it's slender as a bell, it has no
adiposetissue; it's lean and clean. Poorly written poemsshould, of necessity, go on a
diet, to rid themselves of excess verbiage and adjectives. And by'fire' in the next line, I
simply mean that apoem must have a spirit."
"I have always found the next lines difficultto comprehend," I confessed:
It must have the wisdom of bows
And it must kneel like a rose.
"You must remember," Villa said, "somelines and some poems cannot be explained.But
let me try. I am speaking of the archer'sbow. A good bow is one that knows when
toshoot, and one that directs the arrow to itsmark. Just as a good poem, it never goes
astray.To 'kneel like a rose' is a metaphor for humility. All fine people are humble and a
poemshould also be humble, however beautiful it is."
For the seventh and eighth lines,
It must be able to hear
The luminance of dove and deer.
"There's a good man behind every finepoem. A good poet is usually a good
person.'Luminance' naturally means brightness.When I see a good face, it's a good face
and Irespond. When I see a bad face, it is the facefull of crime, even though he doesn't
proclaimhis crime. His face proclaims it out loud."
"In other words," I asked, "the poet knowsthings instinctively?"
"Yes, naturally," Villa answered.
And for the meaning of the next couplet, Iprodded Villa to discuss,
It must be able to hide
What it seeks, like a bride.
Villa, without hesitation, began, "A poemmust not explicitly state meaning. The reader
issupposed to sense it out, feel it. The languageitself doesn't tell you, but the
substructurebehind that language is the real meaning. It isnot explicit and declarative.
That's why when Isay, 'It must have the wisdom of bows,' youmust guess at what I
mean, and children loveto guess at meaning. That's why they love riddles. I used to love
riddles as a child."
The final couplet of this rather unorthodoxsonnet,
And over all I would like to hover
God, smiling from the poem's cover.
is possibly one of the most beautiful ever written. "The last line has a masterfully
dramaticeffect. At the same time, this couplet is, to me,the most mystifying one in the
poem," I commented.
Villa nodded and offered this explanation:"When you see a blessed creature, God
shinesand hovers over that saintly creature. Thepoem itself creates a God-hood, and
the poemradiates Godness. At the same time, God ishovering over it, acknowledging
the Godnessradiating from the poem, itself, which embodies the spirituality existing in a
poem and, atthe same time, radiates it to others."
Indeed, there is a Godness to this poem; andthere is a God-hood within this poet.
PoetRichard Eberhardt understood this, too, evidenced in a review of Villa's work in
which hestates:
A pure, startling, and resoundingbody of poetry, informed with somuch legerity and fire,
remarkably consistent in its devotion to spiritualreality. The subject matter is formidable,
the author a God-driven poet.He arrives at peaks without showingthe strenuous effort of
climbing; thepersonal is lost in a blaze of linguistic glories.... (Eberhardt, 1958)
The poet concludes that reading poetry might be compared to enjoying riddles, and that
children enjoy solving riddles. Since poetry is neither explicit nor declarative, children
must be taught through sheer joy to sense out and feel the meaning. Is there not much
of this that goes on when we are "sensing" or drawing conclusions, or making an
inference? Perhaps we should become more concerned about providing children with
joyous language experiences that will enable them to better understand poetry.

1. Compare and contrast your interpretations of "Lyric 17" to Villa's.

2. Discuss Villa's comments with your cooperative group to explore other

interpretations.

3. Were you surprised by any of Villa's explanations? Explain.

Final Product
Interview one of the students in your cooperative group about his or her definition of
poetry. Write down these views and follow the same interview formatas that used with
Villa.

Sonnet 1 Jose Garcia Villa

2. Sonnet 1

3. Jose Garcia Villa

4. Life • Filipino poet, literary critic, short story writer, and painter. • Awarded National Artist of the
Philippines title for literature in 1973

5. • Received Guggenheim Fellowship in creative writing • introduced the "reversed consonance rime
scheme" in writing poetry thus he was known as the “Comma Poet”. • used the penname Doveglion

6. • He uses Modernism and surrealism as literary movement.

7. Style • Reversed consonance - "The last sounded consonants of the last syllable, or the last principal
consonant of a word, are reversed for the corresponding rhyme.

8. Example Word Rhyme Near Run Reign Rain Green

9. Comma poems "The commas are an integral and essential part of the medium: regulating the poem's
verbal density and time movement: enabling each word to attain a fuller tonal value, and the line
movement to become more measures.”

10. It’s a lyric poem! • A lyric poem is a comparatively short, non- narrative poem in which a single
speaker presents a state of mind or an emotional state.

11. Subcategories 1. Elegy 2. Ode 3. Sonnet 4. Dramatic monologue 5. Occasional poetry

12. Sonnet • A sonnet is a poetic form which originated in Italy. • The term sonnet derives from the
Italian word sonetto, meaning "little song“.

13. Sonnet • It signified a poem of fourteen lines that follows a strict rhyme scheme and specific
structure. • It was originally a love poem which dealt with the lover’s sufferings and hopes.

14. Sonnet 1 Jose Garcia Villa

15. First two lines • First, a poem must be magical, Then musical as a sea-gull.

16. Following 2 lines… • It must be a brightness moving And hold secret a bird's flowering.
17. "There is beauty that is never stationary in the poem. It gives grace with every rhyme. A poem must
gradually change from the beginning into something more beautiful as the poem ends, like the
blossoming of flowers.

18. And so on… It must be slender as a bell, And it must hold fire as well.

19. A poem is not to be written full of adjectives. A poem should have a spirit.

20. FatX

21. It must have the wisdom of bows And it must kneel like a rose.

22. A good poem must show the right message a poet conveys.

23. It must be able to hear The luminance of dove and deer.

24. It must be able to hide What it seeks, like a bride.

25. And over all I would like to hover God, smiling from the poem's cover.