The Secret

The meaning of life, the mystery of life, and the urgency of the moment center on the poem within the poem representing profound meaning. What propels Levertov’s poem is the girls reading a poem and discovering a line that reveals “the secret of life” (Line 2). The poem is a medium for wisdom. Yet the wisdom isn’t legible. The girls don’t reveal the line containing the secret or the secret. The knowledge remains a puzzle and a mystery. As the speaker doesn’t—or can’t—disclose specifics, the symbolism advances the trope that poetry’s meaning is often too difficult to decipher—it’s a code that requires an academic or an expert.

The 20th-century poet Ted Kooser addresses the alleged complexity of poetry. Addressing Modernism and other proceeding forms of ostensibly intricate poetry movements, Kooser says, “Modernism did its best to exclude a lot of readers by its difficulty, its elitism” (Kooser, Ted. “A Conversation with Ted Kooser.” Kenyon Review, 2008). In “Selecting a Reader” (1980), Kooser combats the “elitism” when his speaker chooses a regular, somewhat flippant woman as the ideal reader.