In his anthology Poetry 180: A Turning Back to Poetry, (Random House, 2003) the former United States poet laureate Billy Collins quotes a schoolgirl who writes, “Whenever I read a modern poem, it’s like my brother has his foot on the back of my neck in the swimming pool.” Inspired “to remove poetry far from such scenes of torment,” Collins created a web site called Poetry 180: A Poem A Day for American High Schools. In a recent interview with the Savannah Morning News, he says, “I looked for poems with a human voice, so that I could hear someone talking to me . . . I tended to overlook poems by someone committing an act of literature. I like poems with a sense of humor, irony and lightness. Poems worth reading more than once, but that you get on the first bounce.”
Collins’ poem “Earthling,” which first appeared in The Apple that Astonished Paris, (University of Arkansas Press, 1988) seems to fit that description admirably, as well as being fuel for the current fascination with the planets of our solar system. It is reproduced here with kind permission of the poet.
Earthling
By Billy Collins
You have probably come across
those scales in planetariums
that tell you how much you
would weigh on other planets.
You have noticed the fat ones
lingering on the Mars scale
and the emaciated slowing up
the line for Neptune
As a creature of average weight,
I fail to see the attraction.
Imagine squatting in the wasteland
of Pluto, all five tons of you,
or wandering around Mercury
wondering what to do next with your ounce.
How much better to step onto
the simple bathroom scale,
a happy earthling feeling
the familiar ropes of gravity,
157 pounds standing soaking wet
a respectful distance from the sun.
Note: Billy Collins was appointed poet laureate of the United States in 2001 and held the post until 2003. He is the author of several books of poetry, including The Trouble with Poetry (2005); Nine Horses (2002); and Sailing Alone Around the Room: New and Selected Poems (2001). Speaking of Earthling, he tells DISCOVER that, “Hunters look for upland birds, fishermen search for salmon, poets are on the lookout for metaphors.Those scales used to be the sole reason I would look forward to the class trip to the planetarium.One morning, I saw that a metaphoric possibility lay within. They provided a way to talk about the contentment that earthlings might be grateful for once they considered the impossibility of life on our other planets.”
