describe or explain

The subject was science, and I heard a useful distinction made between ‘describing’ and ‘explaining’. The former is more open to alternative interpretations of what the thing/phenomenon is, showing us what there is to experience. The latter is more closed, trying to say why it is and why it is the way it is.

end and beginning

As I closed the book I sensed that a face turned from me to drift toward another reader.

thin thing

Slide a poem under the door.

shuttered poem

The lines like louvers shut tight against all air and light.

closed in upon

Was that a close reading or a closed reading of the poem?