Art Of Drowning Billy Collins Summary

The poem having the title “The Art of Drowning” says much about what Billy Collins will be discussing about through his writing. It gives off a tone of fearfulness and pessimism, considering the word ‘drowning’. Yet, it also seems like Collins is going to go over ‘the art of drowning’ with a questioning tone, in a way of breaking down the perspective of the person ‘drowning’. Overall, the poem appears to be about fearing life being worthless and/or how being one of millions does not make a difference in the world.

Narrowing it down, Collins commences by questioning “how it all got started, this business about seeing your life flash before your eyes” (Collins 1-2). Collins is talking about how suicide was never a common action to follow through

with, mentioning how “you drown ... crushing decades in the vice of you desperate, final seconds” (3-5). He continues on discussing the panic a person experiences as they enter a path where there is no going back and how the many past years spent living through vanish within seconds. As if he is asking out of curiosity, he inquires, “wouldn’t you hope for a more leisurely review, an invisible hand turning the pages of an album ... on a pony or blowing out candles ... conic hat” (7-10). Collins mentioned earlier about life flashing before one’s very eyes and he carries on with that thought talking about the person being swept away with specks of memories flashing across their mind as they are caught in “a rush of floodwaters” (7). Summing up the first two stanzas, Collins introduces the perspective of the person whose life is slipping out of their hands quickly due to desperation and regret.
Continuing into the third stanza, Collins slowly begins to speak more literal. He compares the ‘flash’ idea used throughout the poem to a “short animated film, a slide presentation” (11). Then he switches to a slight sarcastic tone, but still presses on comparing life to “an essay, or in one model photograph … Wouldn’t any form be better than this sudden flash?” (12-13). He is using these comparisons to illustrate that any sort of ‘presentation’ would be a better way of recognizing one’s life than a mere flash. Though it comes off as slightly sarcastic, he is meant to sound straightforward, resuming with, “Your whole existence going off in your face in an eyebrow-singeing explosion of biography- nothing like the three large volumes you envisioned” (14-16). As young kids, never was it imaginable that one would entangle themselves with deep waters, slashing the string connecting soul and body. Picture-perfect, long lives were planned out, but cut short with one mere decision. In short, Collins speaks more about appreciation of life in this stanza, rather than so easily throwing it away like a trash.
Carrying onto the fourth stanza, Collins becomes coldly practical.

As he hits an angle of actuality, he says, “Survivors would have us believe … some bolt of truth forking across the water” (17-18). In a mocking tone, Collins suggests that the ones who live speak of a life changing moment that was shone upon them and the world is meant to believe the absurdity. He also emphasizes the ‘Light’, describing it as “dawning on you with all its megalithic tonnage” (20) to show much it is exaggerated by these so called ‘survivors’. He is a part of the minor crowd that does not believe in such ridiculous talk and states his opinion as, “But if something does flash before your eyes as you go under, it will probably be a fish” (21-22). Speaking harshly realistic, he points out that the person drowning is most likely to see something as minor as a fish than a grand truth or life vision. Throughout this stanza, he defines this type of death to be a quick, irrelevant death. Along with this, he accentuates the small difference it would make, like someone spitting in the

sea.
Moving onto the last stanza, Collins’ tone is negative to the max, sounding like rejection of the idea of an afterlife.

Even in the first two lines he comments, “a quick blur of curved silver darting away, having nothing to do with your life or your death” (23-24). In these two lines, he dramatizes how irrelevant a life seems after one dies as he compares a micro piece of silver bolting away, not even clearly, but blurrily. Then he proceeds to add a transcendentalist idea with the line “the tide will take you, or the lake will accept it all … sink towards the … bottom” (25-26), noting that the person becomes one with nature after having a quick death. Soon after the lake takes the person into its waters, the person leaves “behind what [they] have already forgotten, the surface…” (27), which implies that once the person is dead, life will not be remembered and all that will be left is the hollow corpse. The last bit of “now overrun with the high travels of clouds” (27-28), makes death seem like flesh-to-earth decay, instead of taking into account an afterlife of some kind. After the person drowns, the lake restores its natural, tranquil state, as if nothing happened and the death of a person had no more significance than the death of a feral

animal.
All in all, Billy Collins changes his poem from being in a twisted positive light to a negative one. One minute, he speaks of how life should not be compared to a meaningless ‘flash’, but rather something presentable with many different points of memories as life carries on. But, the next minute, he speaks about how once someone dies, the world continues as if not a thing occurred. In general, this poem has a negative tone, but nonetheless conveys the thoughts of Collins with an artistic twist of realism and depression.