Especially and to a heightened degree in poetry, this density, this more-than-one-thing-at-a-time, raises the intensity of feeling. Poet Donald Hall observes that, "In logic no two things can occupy the same point at the same time, and in poetry that happens all the time. This is almost what poetry is for, to be able to embody contrary feelings in the same motion."
I don't use this textbook, but this passage is great for disagreeing with, especially if you've got examples in front of you and poets sitting around in plastic rolling chairs at 4pm on a Monday afternoon ready to be talking about such things amidst the percolating from their stomachs.
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