If a person spends all their life collecting
will they not want to acquire a museum?
Does a building become a museum
by simply housing a collection?
How many different ways
can a collection be curated?
If a collection of fossils is curated by the collector’s
age when collected, does it mean more
than if it were sorted by geological age
or by phylum, species or personal preference?
Would a 21st-century child collector of fossils prefer to find
a whole, perfect ammonite or a mere tooth from a dinosaur?
Could an ammonite born four hundred and ten million years ago
envisage being unearthed by a person in the 21st Century?
If a museum were curated by personal preference
would visitors value it or not understand?
What things are valid for inclusion
in a person’s personal museum?
Must a museum contain only tangible objects
or should ideas, smells, sounds and memories be included?
Can memories be evoked more effectively
for a visitor by words or photographs?
Should a museum café offer visitors
only Madeleines or a range of memory prompts?
If a visit to a museum prompts a visitor’s memory,
should they donate it for all to experience?
If more than one collection is experienced
in a museum, will they spark synthesis
in the mind of the visitor and will that match
the intention of the Curator?
Should the aim of curated museum collections be
to educate, to amuse or inspire new collectors
and why do seekers of love often
find unexpected delight in museums?
© Andrew Wilson, 2026
Over at dVerse Poets Pub, Grace in Craft and Toolkit, Meeting the Bar: Critique and Craft, invites us to frame a poem in unanswered questions, perhaps in the style of Pablo Neruda’s “Book of Questions” – a book I have treasured since Laura introduced me to it in a prompt…
Andrew this is a fascinating series of philosophical questions into the nature of curation, memory and our connection to time. It almost reads like a manifesto for a ‘Museum of the Self.’ – brilliant 🙌
Thanks, Anje, I wrote it too, for my one real world poetry group – Museum is next month’s topic at the Keighley Library Poetry Group…
I wondered how you chose the museum but it gives cohesiveness to this collection of Neruda style questions! This is my favourite pick:
“If more than one collection is experienced
in a museum, will they spark synthesis”
p.s. so encouraging when our dVerse prompts lead us into new territory of poet or poetry style, I recall that one now
Thanks, Laura, we usually choose the next month’s topic at the last minute, but a poem from this month suggested either museum, collection, curator or fossil and they chose Museum, but since I suggested those words, they all crept into my poem…
Hope you are keeping well in this cold weather…
I enjoyed the whole philosophical poem, Andrew but, looking back to Valentine’s Day, and my enjoyment of museums, I love these lines especially:
‘why do seekers of love often
find unexpected delight in museums?’
Thanks, Kim, glad you enjoyed it!
Thought provoking questions. This is my favorite part:
If more than one collection is experienced
in a museum, will they spark synthesis
in the mind of the visitor and will that match
the intention of the Curator?
Thanks for joining in.
Thanks, Grace, thanks again for the prompt…
A fascinating collection of questions very well curated! Just like a museum!
A record: I spent more time [18 minutes] reading/digesting/attempting to answer each of your questions than ever I’ve spent on anyone else !!!!! I have friends and family who struggle with vision therefore my favorite question had to be “Must a museum contain only tangible objects or should ideas, smells, sounds and memories be included?” Cheers, Andrew .. and yes, my obit awaits whomever does the honors. And yes, my personality seeps through while trying to maintain all the dignity I possess. (?)
Great poem for reflection. That is a lot for exploration and elaboration.
I can’t build a personal museum of collections. I think the average person keeps scrapbooks, photo albums, library of bookshelves, garden of plants etc for manageable collections.
Mind boggling, Andrew! I am amazed and impressed how you stuck to the theme of museum and ‘curated’ some fabulous questions. Bravo!
Our memories are the best museum – so long as we can hold on to them.
Moving countries a couple of times has seen me cull collections and then search them out again, more often than not, enjoying the search more than the discovery. I am more easily a-mused these days.
Nicely written Andrew 👏
Thanks Shaun!