This is what the poet Ruth Padel’s mother said after she was “dragged” to her first poetry reading. The truth is that many have to be “dragged” to poetry because of the technical issues with rhyme and rhythm or with the way ideas are compressed in poetry. To help more people see the point of poets and poetry, Padel wrote a newspaper column that introduced one poem each week to the readers. She’s a professor, so she has a lot to say. She rises to the challenge of being lively and interesting to people who are not students or professors.
Padel, Ruth. 52 Ways of Looking at a Poem. Vintage Books, 2004, p. 19.