Firstly, it is quite obvious that Billy Collins has quite a thing for nature. In almost all of his poems, he makes descriptions of scenes he has been in or imagined, and describes them with flawless details.
            In his poem “Fishing On The Susquehanna In July” for example, he describes the river perfectly, saying;

“that river curled around a bend under a blue cloud-ruffled sky, dense trees along the banks.” This is astounding imagery, and it makes the reader able to see the river itself clearly in their mind, just like the painting Collins was observing himself. To continue, in his poem “Bonsai,” Collins explains how when looking at the miniature tree, it can “throw a room completely out of whack.” He imagines “The book of matches is a raft, and the coffee cup a cistern to catch the same rain that moistens its small plot of dark, mossy earth.” This puts a lucid imagine in the readers head, and he can see the Bonsai tree sitting on a small island amongst the “Raft” and the “Cistern.”

            In his poem “The Night House,” Collins explains how during the day people are working, and during the night our consciousness awakes and roams around the house. In this poem he uses incredible description to show the reader scenes. For example, Collins writes; “Every day the bod works in the fields of the world mending a stone wall or swinging a sickle through the tall grass – the grass of civics, the grass of money…” This causes the reader to have a crystal clear image of someone cutting grass with a sickle in a meadow or field. By using this genius metaphor, Collins also makes the reader see how the field represents life, and the person he is talking about in the poem is earning money by cutting “the grass of money.”

            Conclusively, it is obvious that Billy Collins has an exquisite talent when it comes to describing scenery and placing a vivid image in the readers head. I’m sure there are many more of his poems that include explicit pictures that can be thrown into ones mind, and make the reader feel like they are actually on the scene Collins is illustrating.