Poetry speaks a universal language. It brings within its compass almost everything — Nature, weather, beasts, beauties, and so on. Though not everyone is a Shakespeare or a Milton, I believe, everyone has a poetic mind, a penchant for rhyme and rhythm - it’s only a matter of time before it’s manifest in one form or the other. Poets are the architects of beauty and melody, expressed so eloquently through their beautiful verses. A poet weaves magic and makes the world gaze and wonder.

Poets have been deemed eccentric and escapists. But the likes of William Butler Yeats, John Milton and William Shakespeare have proven that no one can portray as vivid a picture of life as the poets can. And the penchant for poetry is ubiquitous. It is present in everyone — a scientist, an accountant, an artist, or the man on the street. Robert Fulton, while sitting by the serene Hudson River, first dreamt of a steamboat whizzing off in the calm water, before chiselling his dream into steel and wood. In fact, many scientific inventions that we bring to use these days were first crafted in the heads of their creators. How different are they from the poets, then? Aren’t they too the creators of beautiful dreams that might someday be realised? A poet churns out beautiful verses in his head, an inventor, equally stunning possibilities. The poet, the dreamer, points it out to the scientists and logicians: “This is the future”. They provide the blueprint for the glorious new inventions and discoveries.

Poetry is not limited to human domain either. Nature is perhaps the greatest poet. It’s not for nothing that most poets speak of its wonders. The way it inspires their creation. The manner it lifts them out of mundane world into a glorious realm of endless possibilities, untold beauty and - pure magic! They might take up any subject — common or uncommon, good or bad, beautiful or ugly. They might weave heaven or hell into equal beauty, through the magic working of their words. This is the essence of poetry.

Great poets can make the temporary and ordinary things of everyday life into eternal beauty. Alas, most of us never realise its true importance. Nor do most of us realise our potential as poets.