Explication of Paired Poems

            The poems “My Number” by Billy Collins and “I had heard it’s a fight” by Edwin Denby have different views on the idea of death. Collins paints death as something to be feared, while Denby’s view on death is less serious.

            Collins personifies death as a person who roams around looking for lives to end. Collins asks “Is Death miles away from this house,/ reaching for a widow in Cincinnati” (1-2).  Collins blames unfortunate accidents on the secret work of Death, who is “too busy making arrangements,/ tampering with air breaks,/ scattering cancer cells like seeds” (5-7).  Collins then uses imagery to describe Death as “shaking open the familiar cloak,/ its hood raised like the head of crow;/ and removing the scythe from the trunk?” (13-15). Here, Death is illustrated as the popular figure the Grimm Reaper. This imagery creates fear in the reader because the scythe is commonly associated with death. The narrator then reveals his plan to distract death, saying “Did you have any trouble with directions?/ I will ask, as I start talking my way out of this” (16-17). The narrator has clearly put in a lot of thought about how he will avoid death, showing that the fear of death dominates the narrator’s life.

            Denby, on the other hand, illustrates the fight with death as playful, saying “you wrestle with it, it kicks you/ in the stomach, squeezes your eyes” (3). Although the fight with death sounds painful to the reader, Denby’s tone makes the fight appear to be fun. He enjoys the thrill of the fight, and recalls that “it sneaked up on me like a sweet thrill” (6). Denby also thinks a person has control over their own fate, and death can be avoided by living a healthy lifestyle. This contrasts Collins’ view of death because he thinks a person has no influence over their own fate. Denby further shows his lighter view of death by saying “the crazy thing, so crazy it gives me a kick” (13). Here, he finds parts of death to be humorous, yet he “can’t get over that minute of dying so quick” (14). Denby shows a small fear of death in this line, because he realizes that death comes quickly and unexpectedly. This idea is more similar to Collins’ view of death.