Litany - Billy Collins Questions and Responses

"Why did you switch back and forth from talking about your "lover" to yourself?"

I believe that Collins was trying to show the ridiculousness of love poems. By switching from "complimenting" the lover to himself with absurd metaphors, the reader can easily grasp how funny it actually is to write in this way. Collins could also be expressing that thought that these writers of love poems, could also be craving to say things not just about their lover, but about themselves. Collins does this in a very comical light especially when he switches the metaphors from his lover to himself.

"What possessed you to take the original poem and change it in this manner?"

Collins is trying to teach the original author of this poem a "lesson". He is trying to show the pure ridiculousness of this way of writing a love poem. Collins may say that he is making this particular love poem "better" but we as readers could argue that he is making it "worse". By making the poem more "out there" by using wild metaphors, it makes he point stronger.

"What do you believe to be the most important quality for a poem to have?"

This is an interesting question with what I believe has an interesting answer. Collins doesn't seen to have any love or respect for love poems, and "re-write" one particular poem to make his point. However, this feeling of dislike is obviously important to him, or Collins wouldn't have done anything at all, he would have just let it pass him by indifferent. I think that Collins would find the most important quality in poetry to be honesty. He makes fun of and creates extraneous metaphors in jest, so he may look for the truth in the poetry he reads.