What is the meaning behind the quote "Poetry is plucking at the heartstrings, and making music with them.”

Poetry always speaks to each reader in a different way. We
are each unique, and as such, we bring a totally different set of experiences "to the
table" when we read a poem. It is the same way with quotations, and sometimes it can be
difficult in that the quote may come to us without any context (other writing) to
provide hints. I can give you my impression of what the line
means.

The first thing I notice, though it does not lend
itself to understanding the content, is that the author of the quote (Dennis Gabor) uses
personification to describe poetry in terms of a person—able to pluck, something usually
done with a stringed instrument. And so this line is a metaphor, comparing poetry to a
musical instrument, and it's a logical comparison because poetry is, by nature, so
musical.

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Poetry is plucking at the heartstrings, and
making music with them.

I
believe this means that poetry speaks to our hearts. "Plucking at the heartstrings"
refers to eliciting an emotional response from the reader—but that the response is not
like a single note, but creates an abundance of response in the reader, like that of an
entire musical composition—a complete and beautiful song—where reading anything else
does cannot appeal to the feelings of a reader in the same manner. With a poem, the
experience is often like listening to music, for poetry appeals to the reader on many
levels, but literally, it is most often written (especially if there is rhyme and poetic
devices like rhythm, alliteration, etc.) to sound musical, as
poetry has always been meant to be read aloud rather than read silently from a
page.

Consider "My Papa's Waltz," by Theodore Roetke, which
sounds musical, but can also bring to mind an emotional response of nostalgia in many
readers:

"My Papa's
Waltz"

The whiskey on your breath
Could make a small boy
dizzy;
But I hung on like death:
Such waltzing was not
easy.

We romped until the pans
Slid from the kitchen
shelf;
My mother's countenance
Could not unfrown
itself.

The hand that held my wrist
Was battered
on one knuckle;
At every step you missed
My right ear scraped a
buckle.

You beat time on my head
With a palm
caked hard by dirt,
Then waltzed me off to bed
Still clinging to
your
shirt.

One
source describes the poet's ability to use words to create music, referring to the
creation of "verbal music."

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The poet of verbal music constructs a musical
pattern of words that becomes a source of delight, that moves us as a melody
does.

It
is the emotional response to melody that is compared to the same kind of response to
words in a poem: in the "plucking at the heartstrings."