Something There Is

I'm going to be giving a little talk, "Poetry - What Is It?" on Saturday night in beautiful Verona, Wisconsin - just outside of Madison.

The title belatedly puts me in mind of a couplet from T.S. Eliot:

Oh, do not ask "What is it?"
Let us go and make our visit.

But we will go ahead and ask "What is it?" anyway.

I mean, it must be something, otherwise why do we have a word for it?

Unless it's just imaginary,
something from the land of fairy,
dreamed about with persistence
but missing in existence.