I had a professor once who would show us paintings by Demuth and Sheeler and say, that's where Williams got his inspiration. That's what he's trying to do, but in words rather than paint. And I kept having to point out that this wasn't true at all. Or was true in a very limited sense. After all, you don't just stare at a poem on the page, you read it, it moves through time and has sounds, rhythms. From here I derive a few more maxims.

Poetry is its own art form; it isn't an alibi for some other form of art; but at the same time it has deep affinities with other art forms. Someone who doesn't understand both these things will not understand poetry..

People that aren't really interested in poetry will always try to talk about something that isn't poetry instead of talking about poetry. But since poetry is not exactly what we think it is, these displacements, in the right hands, can sometimes be the best way of talking about poetry.