Have you ever approached a building that you wanted to enter, but couldn't find the door? Frustrating, isn't it? Reading a poem without a title through which to "enter" can be as disconcerting as being locked out of a building. Without a title, a poem is a dark room one can only stumble into bumping against inferences and oblique meanings that may be well written but difficult to grasp - like being thrown into a classroom without know what subject is being taught. The reader is denied the advantage of knowing, in advance, where the journey might take him. I use the word "might", because a title, even a great one, doesn't guarantee direction, but may only provide an idea of where he'll be after the last stanza is read.

Titles are as important to poems as "curb presence" is to selling a house. Show a house with the door hidden, or at best obscure, and prospective buyers will drive by unimpressed. By the same token, see a poem without a title and the browsing reader will have nothing to draw his interest. Titles draw the reader in, cause him to pause, to contemplate the journey.

What, then, is a "good" title? Obviously, what is "good" is utterly subjective. Like any craft, choosing the best title for a poem is intuitive, depends on what you want the reader to know or believe about the poem. For example, read this short emotional poem I wrote some time ago:

Like rain on this page
water-color words
their purpose as
absurd
as her leaving.

So, where does this leave the reader? Slightly confused? Misled? Heading down the wrong hallway? Give it a title..."Rain". Is it about rain? How about, "The Absurdity of Her Leaving" What, divorce? A lover' quarrel, perhaps she has taken a long trip? The actual title of this poem is "Epitaph". Where does the poem take you now? The reader still doesn't know who "left", but I kept that private, letting the reader make up his/her own story.

Another example:

Wednesday afternoons
acrid etched, blue hazed
a covert pall that covets the small
space between lips, the dark
chambers of nostrils.

On those afternoons, youngsters
find other places to flaunt their youth
take their skateboards anywhere
but the mortuary's front walk.

Thursday mornings
shelves and vases, love scented sheets,
bibles and children's teddy bears suffer
the delicate veil of ash
silent, frail,
bone white.

Perhaps this poem is less devious. Here, the title is less a door than perhaps a conformation, a signpost that ensures safe passage. The title for this poem is "Ashes to Ashes".

I include this last example to illustrate how a title can be like good frosting on a better cake.

A cardinal
flares
red
over corn
finches
preen hungry.

This short, succinct poem is a snapshot poem. A quick sketch of a moment at a bird feeder I observed through a window. Title? "At the Bird Feeder". A no-brainer. A poem that is direct, minimal in style requiring, in my mind, a direct, simple title.

You can have fun with titles. Titles can create puzzles the reader can only solve by reading the poem to its conclusion. You can clarify, give credit to another author who may have inspired your work by writing, for example, "Lines Written on a Poem by Donald Hall". This invites the reader to read THAT poem as well as your own. Few poems need, or should have, in my view, a preface or endnote explaining the poet's reason for writing it or providing for the reader information that makes reading the poem a mute point. A well written poem (and its title) should be able to stand on its own without introduction. A title of a poem can be, should be, an open door that makes the poem a memorable and worthwhile journey.