Where do I start with poetic close analysis?

The tool that revolutionised the way I learned for A-Level English is one I wish I'd learned earlier. First of all, try to put all pre-conceptions you have of the piece aside. These are useful once you've built up a sensory reading of the text. Start by drawing a key, with a little doodle for each of sight, sound, smell, taste and touch, and then read through the poem carefully, drawing the appropriate symbol when you read something which relates to the sense. For example, take Ezra Pound's In A Station of the Metro: The apparition of these faces in the crowd: Petals on a wet, black bough. Apparition refers to sight, as does a crowd, which is also representative of noise and hustle and bustle; it is a mixture of the senses. A petal might be visual and pleasing to the touch, something which is wet primarily relates to feeling, and the bough also has a rough texture. By observing the patterns of our sensory observation, we can figure how the poet might be trying to create images in our head. At first, it is metropolitan, as it speaks of the sudden appearances of faces. We flick our heads back and forth to spot new visages, to practice recognition in that busy space. Through it is comparative, which we know from the semi-colon, nevertheless Pound's contrasting images bring us towards nature, in a much more zoomed-in and tangible situation. These are therefore two forms of nature: humanity and flora, both operating their own constant systems, subject to fluctuation and change, fragile and beautiful.