I could no more define poetry than a terrier can define a rat.

"I could no more define poetry than a terrier can define a rat." — so spoke A. E. Housman, the English poet-scholar whose words often bore the weight of simplicity sharpened into steel. In this declaration lies a profound recognition: that poetry is not an object of cold definition but of instinct, a force grasped not by the reasoning mind but by the immediate cry of the heart. Just as the terrier does not theorize upon the nature of the rat but leaps toward it with unerring certainty, so too does the poet know poetry not by logic but by living encounter.

Housman himself was a man divided between scholarship and feeling: a learned classicist by trade, a man of discipline and intellect, yet it was in his poems—simple, lyrical, burning with emotion—that his true soul was revealed. His confession in this quote is an admission of humility: that though he could analyze the verses of the ancients, dissect their meters and grammars, he could not seize the essence of what poetry truly is. For poetry is life’s fire, not life’s diagram. It is known in the body, in the quickening of breath, in the sudden rising of tears, not in the arguments of the scholar.

Consider, O listener, the great Emily Dickinson, who wrote, “If I feel physically as if the top of my head were taken off, I know that is poetry.” She, too, could not define, but only testify to the experience. When she felt the lightning strike of words upon her being, she knew poetry had arrived. Like Housman’s terrier, she did not chase definitions, she chased essence. For art lives in sensation and truth beyond reason, and to demand a rigid definition is to demand that the wind remain still, or the flame hold its shape.

This teaching is echoed throughout history. When the philosopher Aristotle sought to define tragedy, he came close, but even he could only describe its effects—pity, fear, catharsis—never its living soul. Centuries later, poets and critics have tried again and again, yet poetry slips their nets, like water poured into the palm. And why? Because poetry is not a single thing. It is song, it is prayer, it is battle-cry, it is lamentation. It is the terrier’s leap, unplanned and unpremeditated, springing from the marrow of being.

From this we draw a mighty lesson: not everything of worth can be captured by definition. The human spirit craves to measure, to classify, to set boundaries around mystery. Yet some truths are not meant for the cage of reason, but for the open fields of experience. Poetry, like love, like faith, like death itself, belongs to the realm of what can only be lived, never fully explained. To demand definition is to kill the very thing one seeks to honor.

What then should we do, O seeker? The lesson is not to cease questioning, but to accept the limits of reason. When you encounter poetry, do not ask at once, “What is its definition?” but rather, “What does it do within me? What does it awaken, reveal, or change?” Let poetry be a companion, not a specimen. Let your heart, not only your mind, be the measure. For in truth, the terrier does not define the rat—he knows it, he meets it, he acts. So must you with poetry: recognize it by instinct, feel it by life, and embrace it by soul.

Practical action lies thus: read poetry not with the eyes of a dissectionist, but with the ears of one listening for the heartbeat of the world. Do not worry if you cannot define it—neither could Housman, nor Dickinson, nor even the wisest critics. Instead, let the words take hold of you, let them strike your chest, move your blood, stir your spirit. Write, too, if you can—not seeking to define poetry, but to live it. In every line you write, you will learn more than in all the definitions ever penned.

Therefore, remember Housman’s humble wisdom: poetry resists cages. It is wild, instinctive, alive. It cannot be pinned down, only encountered. Do not seek to master it—let it master you. And in that surrender, you will know more of poetry than all the definitions in the world could ever teach.