what the body told - raphael campo

I was recently asked to explain what makes a poem 'good'.

I could babble on for hours explaining poetry and finish by simply saying, it's something you know. But that's a cop-out.

I guess it's a clear image. That's the thing in a poem: the image. And beyond that, it's the universal made new. It's a feeling you know, expressed by an image you have not imagined. That's what ramrods you about good poetry. You've already felt it. You just didn't know it, and you've never articulated it or honored the emotion with an image.

So, see, I could babble on forever, but instead I will give you a poem. This one sums up, to me, what good poetry is.

Not long ago, I studied medicine.
It was terrible, what the body told.
I'd look inside another person's mouth
And see the desolation of the world.
I'd see his genitals and think of sin.

Because my body speaks the stranger's language,
I've never understood those nods and stares.
My parents held me in their arms, and still
I think I've disappointed them; they care
And stare, they nod, they make their pilgrimage

To somewhere distant in my heart, they cry.
I look inside their other-person's mouths
And see the wet interior of souls.
It's warm and red in there — like love, with teeth.
I've studied medicine until I cried

All night. Through certain books, a truth unfolds.
Anatomy and physiology,
The tiny sensing organs of the tongue —
Each nameless cell contributing its needs.
It was fabulous, what the body told.

Raphael Campo