"A Found Poem" by Maxine Kumin

Maxine Kumin was an American poet who was appointed Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the -Library of Congress from 1981-1982. She had multiple awards in her lifetime, including the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry in 1973. She died 6 February 2014 at the age of eighty-eight. 

Ars Poetica
A Found Poem

Whenever I caught him down in the stall, I'd approach.
At first he jumped up the instant he heard me slide
the bolt. Then I could get the door open while
he stayed laying down, and I'd go in on my hands
and knees and crawl over to him so that
I wouldn't appear so threatening. It took
six or eight months before I could simply walk in
and sit with him, but I needed that kind of trust.

I kept him on a long rein to encourage him
to stretch out his neck and back. I danced with him
over ten or fifteen acres of fields with a lot
of flowing from one transition to another.
What I've learned is how to take the indirect route.
That final day I felt I could have cut
the bridle off, he went so well on his own.

Without a title, readers would never know that this poem is actually about poetry. I, along with all horse lovers, would see this poem as being about what horses can teach us.

The poem essentially uses a horse as a metaphor for poetry. It begins with a horse being down in a stall, which tends to symbolize that some injury has occurred. It is entirely plausible that this can be linked with the failed attempt at a good, praise-worthy poem. If your work isn't applauded by others, your pride and motivation can be wounded. The time frame of "six or eight months" can express how much time it can take to earn trust, but moreover, it can display how difficult it is to get a poem just right. Writing poetry isn't easy, and to write one that gains approval from all is even more difficult. Here, the speaker is taking the time to earn the trust back from readers so that she trusts herself and her abilities to write poetry.

Because every day spent with horses is a roller coaster of emotions and new challenges, the enjambments that occur repeatedly force us to ride with the poem. In the second stanza of the poem, we are with the speaker as they ride the horse across fields. We are experiencing the journey with them, and poetry has us experience the journey with the author.

Horses are always teaching us something new, and we are taken on a journey with them every time. Poetry is a learning experience, which is why the horse is an exemplary metaphor for it.