I hadn’t read Rodney Jones’s previous books of poetry (this one is his ninth), but I will now that I’ve read Imaginary Logic: Poems. It a collection full of the familiar and the everyday but described in unexpected and precise ways, and with an eye that is focused and accurate. The poems cover a wide […]
Tomaz Salamun’s “The Blue Tower: Poems”
Born in Croatia and raised in Slovenia, Slovenian poet Tomaz Salamun has published 30 collections of poetry in his native language. His poetry has been translated into more than 20 languages, and he’s had nine collection published in English. The Blue Tower: Poems is the tenth in English, and translated with the author by Michael […]
Donald Hall’s “The Back Chamber”
From the time I was 8 until I was 14, I spent a week each summer at my grandmother’s house in Shreveport. I would sleep in the second bedroom, which was always called “the back room” even though it and my grandmother’s bedroom formed the back of the house. It was the room with a […]
What is Poetry: Falling in Love, 1
The first step towards falling in love, of course, is the cultivation of friendship. And so I have to convince my students that poetry—and the poets who write them—are friends worth getting to know.
Where to Find Words
Is Twitter really mindless for the writer?
Philip Levine Named U.S. Poet Laureate
On Aug. 10, poet Philip Levine was named the U.S. Poet Laureate.
Matthew Duggan’s “Underworld: The Modern Orpheus”
Duggan has done something wonderful here with this retelling of an old, old story. He’s given it a modern sensibility while remaining true to its mythological origins.
Anne Overstreet: Influences and Faith
In June, poet Anne Overstreet published her first collection of poems, entitled Delicate Machinery Suspended: Poems. It is about memory and faith, affection and love, work done and work done well, and even playfulness. The poems are about a life observed, but also a life to come. It’s a beautiful work.
Angela Alaimo O’Donnell’s “Saint Sinatra”
St. Sinatra is a collection that is at once serious and humorous, focused and yet playful. It speaks to and about saints who are both familiar and known for being saints as well as those who are not.
Nick Samaras’ “Hands of the Saddlemaker”
Nicholas Samaras received the award in the 1991 for the Yale Series of Younger Poets competition for this volume of poetry, Hands of the Saddlemaker. Now 20 years old, it has aged well; its themes of exile, pilgrimage, separation and “in this world but not of it” are as current now as they were then, […]
Ava Leavall Haymon’s “Why the House is Made of Gingerbread: Poems”
When I was little, my mother would read stories to me from an oversized yet relatively thin edition of Grimm’s Fairy Tales. It had a green cloth cover, and I remember it specifically because I still have it. (It’s also decorated with writing in crayon, but that’s another story.) One of my favorite stories was […]
“Kingdom Come: Poems” by John Estes
In 2009, we reviewed here a chapbook published by poet John Estes entitled Breakfast with Blake at the Lacoon. In the review we said that Estes effectively evoked a sense of both the literary and everyday reality. That same characteristic is true of his first collection of poems, Kingdom Come: Poems, published by CR Press, […]
National Poetry Month: Wallace Stevens
Wallace Stevens (1879 – 1955) was born in Reading, Pennsylvania, educated at Harvard and the New York Law School, and worked for most of his life as an attorney with the Hartford Insurance Company and its predecessors, and was a vice president at the time of his death. (He turned down a faculty position at […]
National Poetry Month: Billy Collins
Billy Collins has been called the most popular living poet in America, and with good reason: he’s been more than a little successful as a poet, which in some literary quarters is rather unforgiveable. Collins has been U.S. Poet Laureate twice (2001 and 2002) and New York Poet Laureate (2004); received fellowships for the National […]
National Poetry Month: Marcus Goodyear
Marcus Goodyear is senior editor for TheHighCalling.org (sponsored by Foundations for Laity Renewal) and FaithintheWorkplace.com (sponsored by Christianity Today). His poetry has been published in Geez Magazine, 32 Poems and Stonework Journal. Barbies at Communion: and other poems, his first volume of poetry, was published in 2010 and selected as a notable book by Englewood […]
National Poetry Month: Pablo Neruda
Pablo Neruda was the pen name of Neftali Ricardo Reyes Basoalto (1904-1973), a Chilean poet and diplomat whom Gabriel Garcia Marquez called “the great poet of the 20th century in any language.” The article on him at Wikipedia contains a wealth of information about his life, family, involvement in the Spanish Civil War, embrace and […]
National Poetry Month: L.L. Barkat
L.L. Barkat is a writer, editor, poet, columnist, speaker and entrepreneur. She is the author of Stone Crossings: Finding Grace in Hard and Hidden Places, God in the Yard: Spiritual Practice for the Rest of Us, and InsideOut: Poems. Barkat is Managing Editor at The High Calling and staff writer for International Arts Movement’s The […]
National Poetry Month: William Butler Yeats
The career of William Butler Yeats (1865-1939) spanned two centuries, and he became one of the foremost figures of English literature. He was a major force behind the Irish Literary Revival and was a co-founder of the famed Abbey Theater in Dublin. Active in politics, drama and literature, Yeats was awarded the Nobel Prize for […]
National Poetry Month: Gwendolyn Brooks
Gwendolyn Brooks (1917-2000) wrote poetry for more than 70 years, and has the distinction of being the first black author to win the Pulitzer Prize (in 1950 for Annie Allen: Poems). She also received numerous other honors and recognitions, including a nomination for the National Book Award, the National Medal for the Arts, serving as […]
National Poetry Month: Brendan Galvin
Brendan Galvin has published 21 books and chapbooks of poetry. He graduated from Boston College in 1960 with a B.S. degree in the natural sciences, and received his MFA and Ph.D. degrees from the University of Massachusetts. One work, Atlantic Flyway (1980) was short-listed for the Pulitzer Prize and Habitat: New and Selected Poems, 1965-2005 […]