Disorder

Billy Collins' poem "Forgetfulness" is filled with a celebration of disorder as art, bringing to light our fear of forgetting all that we know, to the point of forgetting ourselves, whether it be from old age of simply the long journey of life. The order that this serves as a counterpoint to is learning and knowledge. It names various things that you can learn and it turn forget during your life, starting with novels and moving to things learned in school to finally your name and identity yourself, all lost to the mythological river Lethe, the river of forgetfulness. With it this forgetfulness brings new curiosity, as old facts are re-learned and a regretful yearning for emotional memories and nostalgia. A small and humorous detail of the poem describes a memory as "not even lurking in some obscure corner of your spleen." Memories are stored in your brain, not your spleen, but it is possible to forget that as well, following the path of degeneration and disorder brought on by the information lost from the mind forever.