Summary Of The Names By Billy Collins

In Loving Memory. Consolation is when someone finds comfort after a loss or disappointment. Coping with loss can be excruciating, which explains a reason why it’s the main focus in Billy Collins poem “The Names”. It senses how a person is trying to find an answer on how all they feel is grief. Collins also uses analogies to compare human together. Such as the woods being a mystery like a children's puzzle, or how death is spontaneous like picking from a hat. Humans can’t see the future, so they never know when it’s their time to go and be someone else's memory. Humans experiencing grief try to find consolation by trying to make their lost feel internal. Collins wrote “blue name needled into the skin” (Collins line 24) Tattoos are permanent and that's what humans crave to be. Permanent. However Collins also writes “names wheeled into the dim warehouse of memory.”(Collins line 29) Which can relate to how they're tons of names that ends up inked into skin to help them remember them as more than memories. Although the poem consists of the narrator noticing the names while trying to go through everyday life, it is also written like the narrator in the poem was searching for answers. “I say the syllables as I turn a corner -- Kelly and Lee, Medina, Nardella, and O'Connor.” (Collins line 9) The narrator sees the names everywhere they turn in a

Therefore Collins expressed various examples throughout the poem. “When I peer into the woods, I see a thick tangle where letters are hidden. As in a puzzle concocted for children.” The narrator compares letters that are hidden in a puzzle that was made are children. In a similar fashion Collins writes “Names lifted from a hat Or balanced on the tip of the tongue.” Which in other words mean how spontaneous death is. “So many names, there is barely room on the walls of the heart.” (line 30) In this line a crowded room and an overflowing heart is being compared to each