Billy Collins's "Introduction to Poetry" describes an instructor's efforts to encourage students to engage with a poem both intuitively and emotionally. Instead, "All they want to do," the speaker says, "is tie the poem to a chair with rope/ and torture a confession out of it." I had a similar experience watching Anne Washburn's The Burning Cauldron of Fiery Fire, the lyrical, provocative, and deeply frustrating new …
