Poem Analysis

Billy Collins' "Horizon"
link to blog with poem

Paraphrase:
A Japanese monk's brush and a pencil stub work equally well when drawing a horizon line, because once the line is drawn a third of the way up a piece of paper it's instantly transformed regardless of medium. You had been sitting in your house, but now you're out in nature in whatever kind of place you draw.

The poem has a pretty simple pattern feel to it: six different stanzas of two lines each. There's no rhyme scheme to latch onto, but he still keeps the stanzas connected enough that it doesn't really detract from the reading or understanding. He uses a lot of imagery involving paper, and art supplies. He contrasts this with a lot of nature imagery, and the whole idea behind this seems to be to try to combine the two. This isn't something that's hard to understand; Billy's poems frequently advocate writing and the arts to be used as a tool to express our wonder and connection with nature.
It's really a simple piece when it comes to vocabulary. I think the hardest word used would have to be elemental, and that's really not a difficult word at all. This reflects Billy's attempts to connect to a larger audience. He doesn't use strictly elevated language so that more people will understand and enjoy his poetry.
Billy's tone, and voice make the poem seem both reverent, and have a almost sad sense of longing.
To answer the question "How are the form and content related in this poem?" simply, they are both very simple. The point of the poem is one of reverence to nature and creativity, and the structure is likewise easily identifiable.