“A poem should not mean
But be.”

— Archibald Macleish

"Ars Poetica", Collected Poems, 1917-1982 http://books.google.com/books?id=KI0ESFOvi5QC&q=%22A+poem+should+not+mean+But+be%22&pg=PA107#v=onepage (1985)

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Archibald Macleish 12

American poet and Librarian of Congress 1892–1982

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Context: The meanings of poetry take their growth through the interaction of the images and the music of the poem. The music is not the rhythm, which is a representation of life, alone. The music involves the interplay of the sounds of words, the length of the sequences, the keeping and breaking of rhythms, and the repetition and variation of syllables unrhymed and rhymed. It also involves the play of ideas and images.