Talking with the Tax Man about Poetry

From a review of Billy Collins' Sailing Alone Around the Room:

Billy Collins’ poetry has long been described as “accessible”—a term that has been used as both a compliment and a disparagement. There is no doubt that the simplicity of his language and the applicability of his everyday subject matter make Collins’ poetry interesting and approachable to a wide range of readers. For his devotees, Billy Collins’ brilliance lies in this straightforwardness and its ability to captivate people who are completely unfamiliar with poetry. For his critics, however, his trademark plain language and common themes imply a kind of self-centered superficiality that, while attracting readers, fails in its poetic duty to create new understanding. Good or bad, Collins’ accessibility has brought him commercial success almost unprecedented for a living poet.

See? It's not just me.

(I'm not sure where the "tax man" part of the review's title plays into things but you can see why it caught my eye; it's a perfect fit for this blog, isn't it?)