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The Rain in Portugal
Goodreads Choice Award
Nominee for Readers' Favorite Poetry (2016)From former U.S. Poet Laureate Billy Collins comes a twelfth collection of poetry offering nearly fifty new poems that showcase the generosity, wit, and imaginative play that prompted The Wall Street Journal to call him America's favorite poet.
The Rain in Portugal, a title that admits he's not much of a rhymer, sheds Collins's ironic light on such subjects as travel and art, cats and dogs, loneliness and love, beauty and death. His tones range from the whimsical "the dogs of Minneapolis . . . / have no idea they're in Minneapolis" to the elegiac in a reaction to the death of Seamus Heaney. A student of the everyday, here Collins contemplates a weather vane, a still life painting, the calendar, and a child lost at a beach. His imaginative fabrications have Shakespeare flying comfortably in first class and Keith Richards supporting the globe on his head. By turns entertaining, engaging, and enlightening, The Rain in Portugal amounts to another chorus of poems from one of the most respected and familiar voices in the world of American poetry.
On Rhyme
It's possible that a stitch in time
might save as many as twelve or as few as three,
and I have no trouble remembering
that September has thirty days.
So do June, November, and April.
I like a cat wearing a chapeau or a trilby,
Little Jack Horner sitting on a sofa,
old men who are not from Nantucket,
and how life can seem almost unreal
when you are gently rowing a boat down a stream.
That's why instead of recalling today
that it mostly pours in Spain,
I am going to picture the rain in Portugal,
how it falls on the hillside vineyards,
on the surface of the deep harbors
where fishing boats are swaying,
and in the narrow alleys of the cities
where three boys in tee shirts
are kicking a soccer ball in the rain,
ignoring the window-cries of their mothers.
The Rain in Portugal, a title that admits he's not much of a rhymer, sheds Collins's ironic light on such subjects as travel and art, cats and dogs, loneliness and love, beauty and death. His tones range from the whimsical "the dogs of Minneapolis . . . / have no idea they're in Minneapolis" to the elegiac in a reaction to the death of Seamus Heaney. A student of the everyday, here Collins contemplates a weather vane, a still life painting, the calendar, and a child lost at a beach. His imaginative fabrications have Shakespeare flying comfortably in first class and Keith Richards supporting the globe on his head. By turns entertaining, engaging, and enlightening, The Rain in Portugal amounts to another chorus of poems from one of the most respected and familiar voices in the world of American poetry.
On Rhyme
It's possible that a stitch in time
might save as many as twelve or as few as three,
and I have no trouble remembering
that September has thirty days.
So do June, November, and April.
I like a cat wearing a chapeau or a trilby,
Little Jack Horner sitting on a sofa,
old men who are not from Nantucket,
and how life can seem almost unreal
when you are gently rowing a boat down a stream.
That's why instead of recalling today
that it mostly pours in Spain,
I am going to picture the rain in Portugal,
how it falls on the hillside vineyards,
on the surface of the deep harbors
where fishing boats are swaying,
and in the narrow alleys of the cities
where three boys in tee shirts
are kicking a soccer ball in the rain,
ignoring the window-cries of their mothers.
128 pages, Hardcover
First published October 4, 2016
237 people are currently reading
3421 people want to read
About the author
Billy Collins
148 books1,568 followersWilliam James Collins is an American poet who served as the Poet Laureate of the United States from 2001 to 2003. He was a Distinguished Professor at Lehman College of the City University of New York, retiring in 2016. Collins was recognized as a Literary Lion of the New York Public Library (1992) and selected as the New York State Poet for 2004 through 2006. In 2016, Collins was inducted into the American Academy of Arts and Letters. As of 2020, he is a teacher in the MFA program at Stony Brook Southampton.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 481 reviews
August 7, 2025
Reading this collection of Billy Collins’s poetry from 2016 caused me to reflect on WHAT it is that different poets do.
Meaning: for the first time, I really stopped and thought about what it is that different poets do to me, as a reader, when I experience their work. They may not mean to do it, but poetry is an exchange of currency, isn’t it?
There isn’t one simple answer to this, but I thought it was interesting to think about this, at least briefly.
Random thoughts about this subject come quickly to me. Like, when I read Langston Hughes, Gwendolyn Brooks, or Carl Sandburg, I feel swept up in sounds and rhythm and I often feel buoyant, or uplifted. It’s as though their verse actually raises my frequency.
Ogden Nash, Dorothy Allison and James Tate can actually cause me to laugh out loud. They are clever, and naturally funny, poets.
When I read EE Cummings, W.H. Auden or Yehuda Amichai, I feel I am in the presence of something so profound, I am frequently moved to tears. I feel as though they were called to be the interpreters of our beauty and pain.
Then we have our mystics, poets like Hafiz, Rumi and St. Teresa of Avila, who devoted their lives to channeling the word of a Higher Power. They created bridges for us, to move closer to Spirit. Verse like this can actually create transcendence, for the reader.
Obviously, this is just a quick summary of some basic ideas, using some of my favorite poets as examples. I can’t encapsulate all of my thoughts about centuries of poetry into one little review, but I just wanted to process this idea, at least a little, today.
I wanted to reflect on WHY Billy Collins sells so many books of poetry to a world that doesn’t read enough of it. WHAT is his contribution and WHY is he so successful?
I wonder if he provides comfort, by writing of the mundane? The “setting” of his verse is almost always his house, his yard, or a coffee shop. He writes of art classes at rec centers and on the backs of napkins on beaches.
And he is so damned relatable and consistently amazing.
Only Child
I never wished for a sibling, boy or girl.
Center of the universe,
I had the back of my parents' car
all to myself. I could look out one window
then slide over to the other window
without any quibbling over territorial rights,
and whenever I played a game
on the floor of my bedroom, it was always my turn.
Not until my parents entered their 90s
did I long for a sister, a nurse I named Mary,
who worked in a hospital
five minutes away from their house
and who would drop everything,
even a thermometer, whenever I called.
"Be there in a jiff" and "On my way!"
were two of her favorite expressions, and mine.
And now that the parents are dead,
I wish I could meet Mary for coffee
every now and then at that Italian place
with the blue awning where we would sit
and reminisce, even on rainy days.
I would gaze into her green eyes
and see my parents, my mother looking out
of Mary's right eye and my father staring out of her left,
which would remind me of what an odd duck
I was as a child, a little prince and a loner
who would break off from his gang of friends
on a Saturday and find a hedge to hide behind.
And I would tell Mary about all that, too,
and never embarrass her by asking about
her nonexistence, and maybe we
would have another espresso and a pastry
and I would always pay the bill and walk her home.
Meaning: for the first time, I really stopped and thought about what it is that different poets do to me, as a reader, when I experience their work. They may not mean to do it, but poetry is an exchange of currency, isn’t it?
There isn’t one simple answer to this, but I thought it was interesting to think about this, at least briefly.
Random thoughts about this subject come quickly to me. Like, when I read Langston Hughes, Gwendolyn Brooks, or Carl Sandburg, I feel swept up in sounds and rhythm and I often feel buoyant, or uplifted. It’s as though their verse actually raises my frequency.
Ogden Nash, Dorothy Allison and James Tate can actually cause me to laugh out loud. They are clever, and naturally funny, poets.
When I read EE Cummings, W.H. Auden or Yehuda Amichai, I feel I am in the presence of something so profound, I am frequently moved to tears. I feel as though they were called to be the interpreters of our beauty and pain.
Then we have our mystics, poets like Hafiz, Rumi and St. Teresa of Avila, who devoted their lives to channeling the word of a Higher Power. They created bridges for us, to move closer to Spirit. Verse like this can actually create transcendence, for the reader.
Obviously, this is just a quick summary of some basic ideas, using some of my favorite poets as examples. I can’t encapsulate all of my thoughts about centuries of poetry into one little review, but I just wanted to process this idea, at least a little, today.
I wanted to reflect on WHY Billy Collins sells so many books of poetry to a world that doesn’t read enough of it. WHAT is his contribution and WHY is he so successful?
I wonder if he provides comfort, by writing of the mundane? The “setting” of his verse is almost always his house, his yard, or a coffee shop. He writes of art classes at rec centers and on the backs of napkins on beaches.
And he is so damned relatable and consistently amazing.
Only Child
I never wished for a sibling, boy or girl.
Center of the universe,
I had the back of my parents' car
all to myself. I could look out one window
then slide over to the other window
without any quibbling over territorial rights,
and whenever I played a game
on the floor of my bedroom, it was always my turn.
Not until my parents entered their 90s
did I long for a sister, a nurse I named Mary,
who worked in a hospital
five minutes away from their house
and who would drop everything,
even a thermometer, whenever I called.
"Be there in a jiff" and "On my way!"
were two of her favorite expressions, and mine.
And now that the parents are dead,
I wish I could meet Mary for coffee
every now and then at that Italian place
with the blue awning where we would sit
and reminisce, even on rainy days.
I would gaze into her green eyes
and see my parents, my mother looking out
of Mary's right eye and my father staring out of her left,
which would remind me of what an odd duck
I was as a child, a little prince and a loner
who would break off from his gang of friends
on a Saturday and find a hedge to hide behind.
And I would tell Mary about all that, too,
and never embarrass her by asking about
her nonexistence, and maybe we
would have another espresso and a pastry
and I would always pay the bill and walk her home.
September 21, 2017
Billy Collins was the U.S. Poet Laureate from 2001 to 2003; officially the title is Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress. At present, that title belongs to Tracy K. Smith. “
The Rain in Portugal
” is his twelfth collection of poetry, but the first collection of his that I’ve read.
His writing is whimsical, imaginative and accessible. His topics range from far away places, to cats and dogs, from life and death to art and rock ‘n roll stars, from love to feelings that are hard to put in words. Loneliness, but… not exactly…
Bashō in Ireland
“I am like the Japanese poet
who longer to be in Kyoto
even though he was already in Kyoto.
I am not exactly like him
because I am not Japanese
and I have no idea what Kyoto is like.
But once, while walking around
the Irish town of Ballyvaughan
I caught myself longing to be in Ballyvaughan.
The sensation of being homesick
for a place that is not my home
while being right in the middle of it
was particularly strong
when I passed the hotel bar
then the fluorescent depth of a launderette,
also when I stood at the crossroads
with the road signs pointing in 3 directions
and the enormous buses making the turn.
It might have had something to do
with the nearby limestone hills
and the rain collecting on my collar,
But then again I have longed
to be with a number of people
while the two of us were sitting in a room
on an ordinary evening
without a limestone hill in sight,
thousand of miles from Kyoto
and the simple wonders of Ballyvaughan,
which reminds me
of another Japanese poet
who wrote how much he enjoyed
not being able to see
his favorite mountain because of all the fog.”
There’s an essence, an impression of quirkiness to some of these, but not all. Still often enough you will find yourself looking at something in a new way, a different light. There’s very little that rhymes, but don’t discount it, I’m sure if he thought you were never expecting him to use rhyme, that’s exactly when he’d use it.
Of course, there is a poem about rhyme, entitled “On Rhyme” which, of course, doesn’t.
My other favourite amongst these lovely, accessible poems was:
”Poem to the First Generation of People to Exist After the Death of the English Language”
I’m not going to put a lot of work into this
because you won’t be able to read it anyway,
and I’ve got more important things to do
this morning, not the least of which
is to try to write a fairly decent poem
for the people who can still read English.
Who could have foreseen English finding
a place in the cemetery of dead languages?
I once imagined English placing flowers
at the tombstones of its parents, Latin and Anglo-
Saxon,
but you people can actually visit its grave
on a Sunday afternoon if you still have days of the
week.
I remember the story of the last speaker
of Dalmatian being tape-recorded in his hut
as he was dying under a horse-hair blanket.
But English? English seemed for so many of us
the only true way to describe the world
as if reality itself were English
and Adam and Eve spoke it in the garden
using words like snake, apple, and perdition.
Of course, there are other words for things
but what could be better than boat,
pool, swallow (both the noun and the verb),
statuette, tractor, squiggly, surf, and underbelly?
I’m sorry.
I’ve waste too much on this already.
You carry on however you do
without the help of English, communicating
with dots in the air or hologram hats or whatever.
You’re just like all the ones who say
they can’t understand poetry
but at least you poor creatures have an excuse.
So I’m going to turn the page
and not think about you and your impoverishment.
Instead, I’m going to write a poem about red poppies
waving by the side of the railroad tracks,
and you people will never even know what you’re
missing.
Recommended
His writing is whimsical, imaginative and accessible. His topics range from far away places, to cats and dogs, from life and death to art and rock ‘n roll stars, from love to feelings that are hard to put in words. Loneliness, but… not exactly…
Bashō in Ireland
“I am like the Japanese poet
who longer to be in Kyoto
even though he was already in Kyoto.
I am not exactly like him
because I am not Japanese
and I have no idea what Kyoto is like.
But once, while walking around
the Irish town of Ballyvaughan
I caught myself longing to be in Ballyvaughan.
The sensation of being homesick
for a place that is not my home
while being right in the middle of it
was particularly strong
when I passed the hotel bar
then the fluorescent depth of a launderette,
also when I stood at the crossroads
with the road signs pointing in 3 directions
and the enormous buses making the turn.
It might have had something to do
with the nearby limestone hills
and the rain collecting on my collar,
But then again I have longed
to be with a number of people
while the two of us were sitting in a room
on an ordinary evening
without a limestone hill in sight,
thousand of miles from Kyoto
and the simple wonders of Ballyvaughan,
which reminds me
of another Japanese poet
who wrote how much he enjoyed
not being able to see
his favorite mountain because of all the fog.”
There’s an essence, an impression of quirkiness to some of these, but not all. Still often enough you will find yourself looking at something in a new way, a different light. There’s very little that rhymes, but don’t discount it, I’m sure if he thought you were never expecting him to use rhyme, that’s exactly when he’d use it.
Of course, there is a poem about rhyme, entitled “On Rhyme” which, of course, doesn’t.
My other favourite amongst these lovely, accessible poems was:
”Poem to the First Generation of People to Exist After the Death of the English Language”
I’m not going to put a lot of work into this
because you won’t be able to read it anyway,
and I’ve got more important things to do
this morning, not the least of which
is to try to write a fairly decent poem
for the people who can still read English.
Who could have foreseen English finding
a place in the cemetery of dead languages?
I once imagined English placing flowers
at the tombstones of its parents, Latin and Anglo-
Saxon,
but you people can actually visit its grave
on a Sunday afternoon if you still have days of the
week.
I remember the story of the last speaker
of Dalmatian being tape-recorded in his hut
as he was dying under a horse-hair blanket.
But English? English seemed for so many of us
the only true way to describe the world
as if reality itself were English
and Adam and Eve spoke it in the garden
using words like snake, apple, and perdition.
Of course, there are other words for things
but what could be better than boat,
pool, swallow (both the noun and the verb),
statuette, tractor, squiggly, surf, and underbelly?
I’m sorry.
I’ve waste too much on this already.
You carry on however you do
without the help of English, communicating
with dots in the air or hologram hats or whatever.
You’re just like all the ones who say
they can’t understand poetry
but at least you poor creatures have an excuse.
So I’m going to turn the page
and not think about you and your impoverishment.
Instead, I’m going to write a poem about red poppies
waving by the side of the railroad tracks,
and you people will never even know what you’re
missing.
Recommended
October 12, 2017
I was in the poetry section of my local branch of the public library and I noticed they had a full complement of books by Billy Collins. It had been a while since I'd read a collection of his, and suddenly nothing sounded more refreshing, like the literary equivalent of stepping under a waterfall or drinking a tall glass of grapefruit-flavored San Pellegrino. I decided to go with his most recent collection, and it did not disappoint. As in most of his books, Collins here deals with such topics as nature, animals, travel, the writing process, aging and mortality. There's the usual light touch, the whimsy, the gentle humor, but none of that is to say that Collins is unserious. As a poet, he totally knows what he's doing, and when you read him you know what you're going to get. And that's just fine with me.
May 15, 2025
Sumptuous Collection of New Poems from Esteemed Poet Billy Collins
A sumptuous collection of new poems from Billy Collins, a lifelong New Yorker (from an Irish/Canadian family) who was Poet Laureate for the U.S. from 2001 to 2003.
I love his irresistibly rustic poetry that is nearly as accessible as it is poignant.
My favorites included:
"Greece"
The ruins were taking their time falling apart,
stones that once held up other stones
now scattered on top of one another
as if many centuries had to pass
before they harkened to the call of gravity.
The few pillars still upright
had nervous looks on their faces
teetering there in the famous sunlight
which descended on the grass and the disheveled stones.
And that is precisely how the bathers appeared
after we had changed at the cliff-side hotel
and made our way down to the rocky beach—
pillars of flesh in bathing suits,
two pillars tossing a colorful ball,
one pillar lying with his arm around another,
even a tiny pillar with a pail and shovel,
all deaf to a voice as old as the surf itself.
Is not poetry a megaphone held up
to the whispering lips of death?
I wrote, before capping my pen
and charging into the waves with a shout.
part of "Money Note"
Every time I listen to a favorite opera,
I close my eyes at some point
and wait in the dark for the note to arrive.
It’s the high note I’m expecting,
the one that carries the singer
to the outer limits of his voice ....
* * * *
It’s the note that awakens with a jolt
the dozing spouses in the upper boxes,
who mistake it for a sound of alarm
as if the heavy, dazzling chandelier
were now breaking free of its moorings.
And even the wakeful can misconstrue
the look on the singer’s florid face
as a cry for help, as if someone
could assist him down from such a height.
****
I was also particularly touched by one called, "Only Child," in which he wishes now he had a brother or a sister to see in a sibling some signs of the parents who died several years ago, be they little mannerisms or facial features, and to discuss his mom and dad and growing up.
A superb collection of poetry.
Thank you, Random House and NetGalley for the ARC I was given in exchange for a fair and honest review.
A sumptuous collection of new poems from Billy Collins, a lifelong New Yorker (from an Irish/Canadian family) who was Poet Laureate for the U.S. from 2001 to 2003.
I love his irresistibly rustic poetry that is nearly as accessible as it is poignant.
My favorites included:
"Greece"
The ruins were taking their time falling apart,
stones that once held up other stones
now scattered on top of one another
as if many centuries had to pass
before they harkened to the call of gravity.
The few pillars still upright
had nervous looks on their faces
teetering there in the famous sunlight
which descended on the grass and the disheveled stones.
And that is precisely how the bathers appeared
after we had changed at the cliff-side hotel
and made our way down to the rocky beach—
pillars of flesh in bathing suits,
two pillars tossing a colorful ball,
one pillar lying with his arm around another,
even a tiny pillar with a pail and shovel,
all deaf to a voice as old as the surf itself.
Is not poetry a megaphone held up
to the whispering lips of death?
I wrote, before capping my pen
and charging into the waves with a shout.
part of "Money Note"
Every time I listen to a favorite opera,
I close my eyes at some point
and wait in the dark for the note to arrive.
It’s the high note I’m expecting,
the one that carries the singer
to the outer limits of his voice ....
* * * *
It’s the note that awakens with a jolt
the dozing spouses in the upper boxes,
who mistake it for a sound of alarm
as if the heavy, dazzling chandelier
were now breaking free of its moorings.
And even the wakeful can misconstrue
the look on the singer’s florid face
as a cry for help, as if someone
could assist him down from such a height.
****
I was also particularly touched by one called, "Only Child," in which he wishes now he had a brother or a sister to see in a sibling some signs of the parents who died several years ago, be they little mannerisms or facial features, and to discuss his mom and dad and growing up.
A superb collection of poetry.
Thank you, Random House and NetGalley for the ARC I was given in exchange for a fair and honest review.
December 12, 2020
Another lovely collection, especially the third part. My favorite poems were The Present, Joy, Bags of Time, A Day in May, On Rhyme, Meditation, and Solvitur Ambulando.
Find my book reviews and more at http://www.princessandpen.com
Find my book reviews and more at http://www.princessandpen.com
December 20, 2016
I had to fight myself to not devour these poems in one sitting. Usually poetry feels like more of a chore for me, but Billy Collins is the constant exception. He turns tiny moments into such beauty and thoughtfulness. He was the perfect emotional balm for me this week.
My favorites were his imaginings about having siblings or if his mother we're still alive because those had such depth of emotion for just a few lines.
Sweet, short, smart perfection.
My favorites were his imaginings about having siblings or if his mother we're still alive because those had such depth of emotion for just a few lines.
Sweet, short, smart perfection.
May 14, 2019
Honest and deeply insightful - Billy Collins is a master of the extraordinary in everyday life.
August 31, 2022
I shall use an art analogy here because Collins does make several references to art in his work. This collection for me was like a nice watercolour - I use the word nice intentionally. You look at it, it pleases the eye, might raise a small smile, you like it as long as you are there in front of it but once you have moved on there is nothing in it to make a mark on your memory. Enjoyable in the moment but ultimately quite vapid.
He is also quite wrong about Bruegel’s Icarus which is a fabulous painting but it did cause me to reflect on the number of poems written about Icarus, there’s his own, William Carlos Williams’s but by far the greatest one Failing and Flying by Jack Gilbert which starts with the line;
Everyone forgets that Icarus also flew.
And ends with:
I believe Icarus was not failing as he fell,
But just coming to the end of his triumph.
Now that’s a poem that sticks.
He is also quite wrong about Bruegel’s Icarus which is a fabulous painting but it did cause me to reflect on the number of poems written about Icarus, there’s his own, William Carlos Williams’s but by far the greatest one Failing and Flying by Jack Gilbert which starts with the line;
Everyone forgets that Icarus also flew.
And ends with:
I believe Icarus was not failing as he fell,
But just coming to the end of his triumph.
Now that’s a poem that sticks.
August 31, 2016
If you are unfamiliar with Billy Collins, go watch these two videos before reading my review or making a judgment based on the somewhat strange cover:
"Aimless Love"
"Litany"
Once you hear Collins read with his sardonic tone, you always have to hear his poems in that same dry manner or they will not make as much sense. So do please indulge me.
This was a great new collection, but after getting to listen to his previous collection in audio, I think you just can't do as much justice to it in print. That's a format issue, not an issue with the poems.
My favorites:
"Dream Life"
"...Poetry works long hours
and rarely speaks to the tailor
as she bends to repair the fancy costumes
of various allegorical figures...."
"The Present"
"...The trouble with the present is
that it's always in a state of vanishing."
"Note to J. Alfred Prufrock" (ha, you have to read the entire thing)
"December 1st"
"..Some days, I look worse than yesterday's oatmeal."
"Solvitur Ambulado" - a musing on whether it gets solved by walking
"Meditation" - funny because I related
"Aimless Love"
"Litany"
Once you hear Collins read with his sardonic tone, you always have to hear his poems in that same dry manner or they will not make as much sense. So do please indulge me.
This was a great new collection, but after getting to listen to his previous collection in audio, I think you just can't do as much justice to it in print. That's a format issue, not an issue with the poems.
My favorites:
"Dream Life"
"...Poetry works long hours
and rarely speaks to the tailor
as she bends to repair the fancy costumes
of various allegorical figures...."
"The Present"
"...The trouble with the present is
that it's always in a state of vanishing."
"Note to J. Alfred Prufrock" (ha, you have to read the entire thing)
"December 1st"
"..Some days, I look worse than yesterday's oatmeal."
"Solvitur Ambulado" - a musing on whether it gets solved by walking
"Meditation" - funny because I related
January 4, 2018
Billy Collins is that oddity in America: He is a poet and he is a popular poet. Somehow he doesn't disappoint anyone. He is able to be clever and and fresh and wise and profound and funny. He is a delight.
Billy Collins may be the only person saving poetry from popular death. He is magnificent. Try him. Even if high school English class killed your desire to ever read a poem again.
Billy Collins may be the only person saving poetry from popular death. He is magnificent. Try him. Even if high school English class killed your desire to ever read a poem again.
September 25, 2017
Little nuggets of gold!
Just loved these poems so quirky and thought provoking.
Just loved these poems so quirky and thought provoking.
May 4, 2021
Review to come
February 1, 2019
Easy to read in one gulp, very friendly, and utterly forgettable unfortunately. I thought vaguely that I might read some more by Collins... until the last few poems included one on pissing outside at a party (um, why? because we clearly need a poem from the perspective of someone taking a leak in the bushes?) and one that's frankly really not nice about people with anxiety. So... *shrugs* Glad I finally tried his poetry but I think that's enough for me.
January 9, 2020
I heard Billy Collins read for the first time this past July (2019) at the John Hewitt International Summer School in Armagh, Northern Ireland. He was the main attraction at their evening poetry reading. Collins loves Ireland and the Irish love him. He had gotten married the day before but showed up for his eager audience. Collins writes whimsical (I considered looking for another word because I imagine it has been overused to describe his work) poems that appeal to many who think they don’t like poetry. He pays attention to those things that most of us take for granted. Yes, occasionally he does write about sunsets and sunrises such as in Joy , the final poem in the book. But the quotidian does not preoccupy his poems. Instead, he writes about the rain in Portugal, which is a line in his poem titled On Rhyme .
Who won’t laugh reading “…what I liked best about dogs in Minneapolis is that they have no idea they’re in Minneapolis” (from In Praise of Ignorance ).
Even funnier is this excerpt from Microscopic Pants .
…like saying the ants in your pants have ants
in their pants...because it’s fun to think of ants wearing pants,
and it rhymes. Plus, it suggests an infinite
series of tinier and tinier ants
pulling on smaller and smaller pair of pants,
like the facing barbershop mirrors
of my childhood when my newly shorn head
Would repeat itself down the hallway of reflections.
My mother had a clothespin bag with a picture of a woman hanging clothes on the line with the same clothespin bag with a woman hanging clothes ad infinitum.
Collins can be reflective and serious as he shows in the poem he read at Seamus Heaney’s funeral in 2013 : Speed Walking on August 31, 2013 . This is the first volume of Collins’ poems I have read. I bought Aimless Love: New and Selected Poems in Armagh, and have Taking Off Emily Dickinson's Clotheson my shelves. You may think that poetry is not for you, but then I assume you haven’t read Billy Collins.
I had to reformat and post this review. For some reason, the original post was missing parts of sentences and formatting.
Who won’t laugh reading “…what I liked best about dogs in Minneapolis is that they have no idea they’re in Minneapolis” (from In Praise of Ignorance ).
Even funnier is this excerpt from Microscopic Pants .
…like saying the ants in your pants have ants
in their pants...because it’s fun to think of ants wearing pants,
and it rhymes. Plus, it suggests an infinite
series of tinier and tinier ants
pulling on smaller and smaller pair of pants,
like the facing barbershop mirrors
of my childhood when my newly shorn head
Would repeat itself down the hallway of reflections.
My mother had a clothespin bag with a picture of a woman hanging clothes on the line with the same clothespin bag with a woman hanging clothes ad infinitum.
Collins can be reflective and serious as he shows in the poem he read at Seamus Heaney’s funeral in 2013 : Speed Walking on August 31, 2013 . This is the first volume of Collins’ poems I have read. I bought Aimless Love: New and Selected Poems in Armagh, and have Taking Off Emily Dickinson's Clotheson my shelves. You may think that poetry is not for you, but then I assume you haven’t read Billy Collins.
I had to reformat and post this review. For some reason, the original post was missing parts of sentences and formatting.
December 17, 2020
From the opening poem, 1960, I was drawn into the writing and style delivered by Collins. 1960 centers on the ambient sounds in those live recordings of music...named in particular here is a man's cough, so well known that it becomes a part of the song like a note being played.
It's as if Collins speaks a language called Poetry and it's so accessible, translatable, and conversational, you didn't realize you spoke it, as well. Some of the poems are quietly thoughtful, but many are injected with charm or humor or a muted simplicity that lands on such familiar ground, you're sure to find your footing.
It's as if Collins speaks a language called Poetry and it's so accessible, translatable, and conversational, you didn't realize you spoke it, as well. Some of the poems are quietly thoughtful, but many are injected with charm or humor or a muted simplicity that lands on such familiar ground, you're sure to find your footing.
July 22, 2017
A nice relaxed collection of poetry that often made me smile with its randomness. If you're looking for deep metaphors or rhyme schemes, this isn't the collection for you. If however you like curious phrasing, life observations, and little slices of modern day relatable real life, this collection might be great for you.
I found it relaxing, friendly, never intense although at times poignant. The only distraction was line spacing to divide poems into three line stanzas for ease of legibility more than function or purpose. That said, I'd actually give this collection 3.5 stars. A 3 star book would be a good book while a 4 star book would be one I'd recommend to anyone. Having gotten this at a library, I think it's a great library book to see if you enjoy because no doubt some people will really enjoy and consider it a worthy add to their collection.
In short, if you're looking for a relaxing poetry collection with warm smiles and small chuckles, this might be for you.
I found it relaxing, friendly, never intense although at times poignant. The only distraction was line spacing to divide poems into three line stanzas for ease of legibility more than function or purpose. That said, I'd actually give this collection 3.5 stars. A 3 star book would be a good book while a 4 star book would be one I'd recommend to anyone. Having gotten this at a library, I think it's a great library book to see if you enjoy because no doubt some people will really enjoy and consider it a worthy add to their collection.
In short, if you're looking for a relaxing poetry collection with warm smiles and small chuckles, this might be for you.
February 5, 2017
I love Billy Collins: his unpretentious but evocative language, his light but subtly existential tones, his exactitude and thoughtfulness. I feel bad for him sometimes, partially because he's been so successful. It must suck to have had to have been the Poet Laureate of George W Bush, for instance, and for all the public exposure, people thinking the poems are just there to be laughed with, funny though they often are. It's not always easy to be considered "America's favorite poet" I'd bet.
But with this collection, I had the consistent disappointed feeling that he's running out of ideas.
November 22, 2020
Published in 2016, The Rain in Portugal finds Billy Collins still looking out at a nice day or looking at his cat. Sometimes he is still irritated by his students or cold weather, but these are mostly cozy and charming poems written in a wry style and that sometimes yield a sort of boyish wonder.
What makes Collins stand out from other poets? I suspect that nearly all poets are expressive and many are wry or charming. Perhaps what sets Collins apart is his imagination and how he uses it to generate a reaction. For example:
"Poem to the First Generation of People to Exist After the Death of the English Language"
What makes Collins stand out from other poets? I suspect that nearly all poets are expressive and many are wry or charming. Perhaps what sets Collins apart is his imagination and how he uses it to generate a reaction. For example:
"Poem to the First Generation of People to Exist After the Death of the English Language"
I'm not going to put a lot of work into thisI tend to struggle with short story and poetry collections because even the greatest hits don't always work for me. But when these poems work, they are not unlike reading the funny pages next to a fireplace with one's morning coffee. There are worse things in life.
because you won't be able to read it anyway,
and I've got more important things to do
this morning, not the least of which
is to try to write a fairly decent poem
for the people who can still read English.
October 13, 2017
I saw that look that you gave me, Billy Collins, when I said nothing as you signed my book. It was the look of someone trying to puzzle out an anecdote from the moment (or probably a poem, in your case). I could have blathered on about how my students used to always discover that they liked poetry after I introduced them to you. But I was sure you’d heard it before. However, it seemed that perhaps you still needed to satisfy your curiosity about those of us in the crowd who weren’t of the wholly-grey-haired persuasion or perhaps those of us not gushing outwardly even if we were excited inwardly to be there listening to your inner muse musing about cheerios and dogs and sisters that you don’t actually have. And the rain in Portugal--because the rain in Portugal deserves just as much thought as the rain in Spain after all.
One thing that strikes me, Mr. Collins … wait, no. I can’t call you that because that’s on your list of pet peeves (“Mister Shakespeare”, p. 81). Sorry. Billy? May I call you Billy? Anyhow, Billy, one thing that strikes me is that you spend quite a lot of time contemplating poetry I’ve not read and art that I’ve not seen, along with dogs and cats, music and windows. Sunsets and sunrises seen on the same day. I find that I often read poets like you and Lawrence Ferlinghetti just to become acquainted with poetry and art I don’t yet know. And you managed to help me answer a Portuguese question I’ve run into thrice in a week. So perhaps your book was aptly named after all. Twice I’ve seen native Portuguese speakers use the word heteronym instead of pseudonym, and I thought that they were just translating incorrectly. But, no, it’s that Portuguese poet Fernando Pessoa called his pseudonyms heteronyms because he felt that each one was a completely different persona. So thank you for clearing that up for me and adding to my growing list of Portuguese writers and poets that I need to read (starting with Pessoa and his 75 heteronyms). But you knew that, so I’m not sure why I’m telling you this.
I haven’t in several years taught the class where my students used to fall in love with poetry through you. A teacher ingests stories and poetry in a way that breathes new life into them. I’d need to read these poems 3 or 4 times with Google, all of Pessoa’s 76 incarnations, and the Japanese poet who longed to be in Kyoto (whoever he may be) by my side in order to get all your references and start to feel them in all their depth. Perhaps I’ll come back then and list all my favorite lines and poems from this book and then give the ending of this review the proper something something that it deserves.
One thing that strikes me, Mr. Collins … wait, no. I can’t call you that because that’s on your list of pet peeves (“Mister Shakespeare”, p. 81). Sorry. Billy? May I call you Billy? Anyhow, Billy, one thing that strikes me is that you spend quite a lot of time contemplating poetry I’ve not read and art that I’ve not seen, along with dogs and cats, music and windows. Sunsets and sunrises seen on the same day. I find that I often read poets like you and Lawrence Ferlinghetti just to become acquainted with poetry and art I don’t yet know. And you managed to help me answer a Portuguese question I’ve run into thrice in a week. So perhaps your book was aptly named after all. Twice I’ve seen native Portuguese speakers use the word heteronym instead of pseudonym, and I thought that they were just translating incorrectly. But, no, it’s that Portuguese poet Fernando Pessoa called his pseudonyms heteronyms because he felt that each one was a completely different persona. So thank you for clearing that up for me and adding to my growing list of Portuguese writers and poets that I need to read (starting with Pessoa and his 75 heteronyms). But you knew that, so I’m not sure why I’m telling you this.
I haven’t in several years taught the class where my students used to fall in love with poetry through you. A teacher ingests stories and poetry in a way that breathes new life into them. I’d need to read these poems 3 or 4 times with Google, all of Pessoa’s 76 incarnations, and the Japanese poet who longed to be in Kyoto (whoever he may be) by my side in order to get all your references and start to feel them in all their depth. Perhaps I’ll come back then and list all my favorite lines and poems from this book and then give the ending of this review the proper something something that it deserves.
November 3, 2020
I was not prepared for how funny these poems would be!
I'm a simple person. Any poet who can write about a cat's butt-hole has me charmed.
And then the poem right after that was about being an only child, and that hit home with TRUTH.
... that was it for me.
I'm a simple person. Any poet who can write about a cat's butt-hole has me charmed.
Lucky Cat
It's a law as immutable as the ones
governing bodies in motion and bodies at rest
that a cat picked up will never stay
in the place where you choose to set it down.
I bet you'd be happy on the sofa
or this hassock or this knitted throw pillow
are a few examples of bets you are bound to lose.
The secret of winning, I have found,
is to never bet against the cat but on the cat
preferably with another human being
who, unlike the cat, is likely to be carrying money.
And I cannot think of a better time
to thank our cat for her obedience to that law
thus turning me into a consistent winner.
She's a pure black one, quite impossible
to photograph and prone to disappearing
into the night or even into the thin shadows of noon.
Such an amorphous blob of blackness is she
the only way to tell she is approaching
is to notice the two little circles of her eyes
then only one circle when she is walking away
with her tail raised high-- something like
the lantern signals of Paul Revere,
American silversmith, galloping patriot.
And then the poem right after that was about being an only child, and that hit home with TRUTH.
Only Child
I never wished for a sibling, boy or girl.
Center of the universe,
I had the back of my parents' car
all to myself. I could look out one window
then slide over to the other window
without any quibbling over territorial rights,
and whenever I played a game
on the floor of my bedroom, it was always my turn.
Not until my parents entered their 90s
did I long for a sister, a nurse I named Mary,
who worked in a hospital
five minutes away from their house
and who would drop everything,
even a thermometer, whenever I called.
"Be there in a jiff" and "On my way!"
were two of her favorite expressions, and mine.
And now that the parents are dead,
I wish I could meet Mary for coffee
every now and then at that Italian place
with the blue awning where we would sit
and reminisce, even on rainy days.
I would gaze into her green eyes
and see my parents, my mother looking out
of Mary's right eye and my father staring out of her left,
which would remind me of what an odd duck
I was as a child, a little prince and a loner
who would break off from his gang of friends
on a Saturday and find a hedge to hide behind.
And I would tell Mary about all that, too,
and never embarrass her by asking about
her nonexistence, and maybe we
would have another espresso and a pastry
and I would always pay the bill and walk her home.
... that was it for me.
January 9, 2018
Mostly wonderful.There were so many similarities to Roger Rosenblatt that I started thinking "I know why you have never seen them together".One of the (few)complaints about Collin's work is that the structure of his poems are similar to each other.You could say that about most poets.It's like some people complaining about prose dialogue that doesn't have quotation marks.Rules,rules rules.
October 18, 2016
"What a brazen wonder to be alive on earth/ amid the clockwork of all this motion!"
November 5, 2017
I could spend weeks reading and re-reading these poems. Part 3 was definitely my favorite.
March 2, 2017
So disappointing, a true 2.5 book of neutral. I want to be moved by poetry, and while I found this fine in its way, it was not at all profound to me. Undoubtedly part of the problem is that 95% of these poems are formatted similarly, with 3, 4 or 5 phrase stanzas for a page to a page and a half. Nothing wrong with that, except at book length, it gets repetitous and then the poems start to feel equally repetitious. I pulled out the one about the dogs, Species, but mostly because as a former dog owner I found it sweet. Maybe I'm just a poetry collection and less of a single author poetry book sort of reader.
August 19, 2016
3.5 stars, 7 out of 10
I have read several poems by Billy Collins previously, and have also heard him performing some (online), so I was interested in reading this, his latest volume of poetry (to be published in October 2016).
There were more than 50 poems in this collection. I read all of them, and 20 of them more than once.
My favourites of them were ' Hendrik Goltzius's "Icarus" (1588)' (with its links to W.H. Auden's poem "Musée des Beaux Arts'), 'Portrait', and 'The Day After Tomorrow' (with its links to Fernando Pessoa).
Although I enjoyed many of the poems in this collection, I can see that several of them would be more effective when performed out loud by the author. The ones that I enjoyed reading most, were those that could be understood on more than one level. (I wonder whether Billy Collins would say that this applies to all his poems?)
Thank you to Random House Publishing Group and to NetGalley for an ARC.
I have read several poems by Billy Collins previously, and have also heard him performing some (online), so I was interested in reading this, his latest volume of poetry (to be published in October 2016).
There were more than 50 poems in this collection. I read all of them, and 20 of them more than once.
My favourites of them were ' Hendrik Goltzius's "Icarus" (1588)' (with its links to W.H. Auden's poem "Musée des Beaux Arts'), 'Portrait', and 'The Day After Tomorrow' (with its links to Fernando Pessoa).
Although I enjoyed many of the poems in this collection, I can see that several of them would be more effective when performed out loud by the author. The ones that I enjoyed reading most, were those that could be understood on more than one level. (I wonder whether Billy Collins would say that this applies to all his poems?)
Thank you to Random House Publishing Group and to NetGalley for an ARC.
January 13, 2018
People think of poetry and they think of grand, sweeping epics & stanzas that you have to stare at forever to decipher anything resembling sense or meaning. I enjoy Billy Collins because he talks to his readers about stuff so ordinary it should be dull as dirt, yet it's not and there is a lot to be gained from it. He paints a picture that is so familiar, you can see it like you're looking at something you've seen a million times, like Mona Lisa. One of my favorites:
Many Moons
The thinnest of slivers can come
as a surprise to some nights.
A girl leaving a restaurant
points up to show her friends.
And there is a full one,
bloated with light,
a bright circle over the city
keeping the dreamers from sleep.
But the moon tonight
is crossed by drift of clouds
and looks like a mug shot
of a criminal, a cornered man.
One of its seas forms a frown
that makes for a grudging look.
The last thing it ever wanted
was to end up being a moon.
It's the only light in the sky
save for a solitary star,
whose sisters and brothers
must be blinking somewhere afar,
leaving the moon and me
to circle in our turning places,
his face remote and cold,
mine warm but vexed by his troubles.
Many Moons
The thinnest of slivers can come
as a surprise to some nights.
A girl leaving a restaurant
points up to show her friends.
And there is a full one,
bloated with light,
a bright circle over the city
keeping the dreamers from sleep.
But the moon tonight
is crossed by drift of clouds
and looks like a mug shot
of a criminal, a cornered man.
One of its seas forms a frown
that makes for a grudging look.
The last thing it ever wanted
was to end up being a moon.
It's the only light in the sky
save for a solitary star,
whose sisters and brothers
must be blinking somewhere afar,
leaving the moon and me
to circle in our turning places,
his face remote and cold,
mine warm but vexed by his troubles.
February 27, 2017
Better Rainstorms
Billy Collins is his usual, offhand self here, but the effort appears mailed in. It's like he decided that not only may we reject formalism, but also any pretense to quality. A thin submission.
That said, his elegiac homage to a male piss was brilliant (if also aware of its audience):
It’s very peaceful pissing under the stars or beneath the mild colors of twilight, so refreshing to take a deep breath outdoors then exhale all the woes of the day and even the longer woes and thorns of the year. Such a calm descends like a calm descending as you piss from a dock into a wavy lake and think about your many brethren, spread out across the land, pissing tonight against a tree beyond the circle of a campsite or watering a flowering bush at a corner of a lawn.
If only more brothers recognized their shared brotherhood in a piss, we would all be better off.
Billy Collins is his usual, offhand self here, but the effort appears mailed in. It's like he decided that not only may we reject formalism, but also any pretense to quality. A thin submission.
That said, his elegiac homage to a male piss was brilliant (if also aware of its audience):
It’s very peaceful pissing under the stars or beneath the mild colors of twilight, so refreshing to take a deep breath outdoors then exhale all the woes of the day and even the longer woes and thorns of the year. Such a calm descends like a calm descending as you piss from a dock into a wavy lake and think about your many brethren, spread out across the land, pissing tonight against a tree beyond the circle of a campsite or watering a flowering bush at a corner of a lawn.
If only more brothers recognized their shared brotherhood in a piss, we would all be better off.
June 1, 2022
Ah, at last, some enjoyable poetry. I figured if this guy, a poet laureate, recognized by some as America’s most beloved poet, doesn’t do the trick…but he did, he really did.
Still no rhyme (modern poetry seems to abhor the tradition), but there’s a rhythm here and definitely a reason. The poems are descriptive and come in three sections, featuring different themes. Just the author ruminating and reminiscing, in an accessible, engaging and not over-pretentious way about different aspects of his life and travels.
The range of the themes is a sheer pleasure. It’s difficult to find lately. BIPOC poets tend to write about race. Female poets write about feminism. LGBTQ poets write about gender and sexuality. All very narrow, very for us by us. It was nice to just read a book about random things, a different kind of diversity. Without a heavy-handed message or an agenda.
Ok. Good. I’d read more of this author. Our library has more.
Still no rhyme (modern poetry seems to abhor the tradition), but there’s a rhythm here and definitely a reason. The poems are descriptive and come in three sections, featuring different themes. Just the author ruminating and reminiscing, in an accessible, engaging and not over-pretentious way about different aspects of his life and travels.
The range of the themes is a sheer pleasure. It’s difficult to find lately. BIPOC poets tend to write about race. Female poets write about feminism. LGBTQ poets write about gender and sexuality. All very narrow, very for us by us. It was nice to just read a book about random things, a different kind of diversity. Without a heavy-handed message or an agenda.
Ok. Good. I’d read more of this author. Our library has more.
November 27, 2017
Poetry for people who generally don't give a flying fart for poems. Or for people who like cats.
I love that Collins doesn't try to obscure his meaning. The premises of his poems are often simple observances, but they stick with you for their humor or because they have a way of flipping an everyday situation on its head.
However, every now and then, he sneaks in a wistful poem that speaks to the impermanence of life, and these were my favorites. Yet it's the volume as a whole that makes him my new favorite poet; his arrangement of his poems make this book feel like a cozy chat over coffee with a friendly man whose cat keeps rubbing against your leg. There are some books that you enjoy having read, but this is one that I genuinely enjoyed reading.
I love that Collins doesn't try to obscure his meaning. The premises of his poems are often simple observances, but they stick with you for their humor or because they have a way of flipping an everyday situation on its head.
However, every now and then, he sneaks in a wistful poem that speaks to the impermanence of life, and these were my favorites. Yet it's the volume as a whole that makes him my new favorite poet; his arrangement of his poems make this book feel like a cozy chat over coffee with a friendly man whose cat keeps rubbing against your leg. There are some books that you enjoy having read, but this is one that I genuinely enjoyed reading.
April 27, 2019
My first proper exposure to Collins. This collection is accessible, grounded, often lovely, and sometimes surprising and/or funny. Collins has an endearing way of finding depth and angst in mundane moments--endearing especially because he's usually too self aware and sincere to come across as pretentious. A few of the poems in this book are delightful to read aloud. Collins has a great sense of rhythm and sound even in his most conversational poems.
My favorites: Greece, Money Note, The Present, Bravura, In Praise of Ignorance, December 1st, Thanksgiving, Under the Stars, Mister Shakespeare, Solvitur Ambulando
My favorites: Greece, Money Note, The Present, Bravura, In Praise of Ignorance, December 1st, Thanksgiving, Under the Stars, Mister Shakespeare, Solvitur Ambulando
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