Escapism, words and poetry

I've recently noticed again that my interests are not conventional. In my German class today, my teacher had prepared an activity in which we had to talk to the other students to find out who a certain statement applied to. One of the statements translated as, "Who prefers reading to watching TV?" That, of course, would be me. No one else there would have said that, although I know that I'm not the only person in the world who would. Anyway, no one asked me why that was true, but I asked myself. I guess I wasn't really allowed (?) to watch much TV when I was growing up, but I was given nearly unlimited access to books. Some people now watch TV to escape; I used to read to escape. As Azar Nafisi writes, "...the child I had been when I would indiscriminately and waywardly pick up books, slouch in the nearest available corner, and read and read. ....and read them all, an alcoholic drowning her inarticulate sorrows." I really did enjoy reading, though, so I never stopped doing that. I still fall into that trap often. I've found that I hate analyzing books, and I think this is because analyzation destroys the illusion the book creates. Not only does it keep me from escaping into the book, it also takes away from the beauty of the book itself. That concept is kind of hard to explain. Almost nothing is more beautiful to me than seeing how words interact to form the majesty of a book. Somehow taking the words apart and searching for deeper meaning violates a sense of connection ... I know, that doesn't make any sense, and I'm about to contradict myself by saying that words in themselves are intrinsically meaningful, but there's just so much that I can't explain about this. It's completely illogical, really. Words just fascinate me; everything about them does. They're powerful and magical and breathtaking; words are what construct our reality. They're a force to be reckoned with. I love seeing how these dynamic creatures play together, and always marvel at the diversity of the images they can create, sometimes just by a little bit of rearrangement. I think this is why poetry appeals to me so much. In some ways, a poem is a sculpture in words. One word makes the jawline strong and masculine; another softens it a bit and makes it more androgynous. I have so much respect and admiration for poets. There's a talent there that is a gift, and it can be such a blessing to read a poem and get a glimpse beyond the known.