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The fires of poetry Paglia offers a book to a generation absorbed with images, detached from the interior of culture. Paglia writes, "The only antidote to the magic of images is the magic of words.'' Here she demonstrates the power of words for suggesting images better than those seen with eyes. Paglia is captivated by poetry. Her excitement develops when she carefully commentates on one poem at a time - avoiding general brushstrokes as she identifies the subtleties from various lines. As it's been said, "from this book you could doubt several aspects of her taste in poetry. But you couldn't doubt her love of it." You can hear Paglia's disappointment when she writes, "Along the way I've encountered so many people in the publishing world, in magazines, who said to me, you know, 'I always keep up with the new novels, but not poetry.' These are really literary people, and even they feel poetry no longer speaks to them." Paglia suggests an explanation for the decline in the love of poetry, "Thanks to 25 years of post-structuralism in our elite colleges, we have this idea now that you are supposed to use your pseudo-sociological critical eye to look down on the work and find everything that's wrong with it," ...this style of teaching just nips students' enthusiasm in the bud." However, her statement is tempered by what I appreciate most - her discrimination regarding true talent and her lack of tolerance for those poetry artists who insist on using it as an instrument of civil rights - while at the same time lacking excellence in their work. While Paglia's selection of 43 poems may be `eclectic', she comments on superior works including Shelley's retro-prophetic `Ozymandias', Coleridge's heroic `Kubla Khan', and Wallace Stevens's gem `Disillusionment of Ten O'Clock' Paglia's strength is teaching us how to visualize implication in the once inconsequential, and thereby to making a poem alive and memorable. Perhaps that's the very purpose of poetry.