The Poem Is You

60 Contemporary American Poems and How to Read Them

Stephanie Burt

• Publisher: Belknap Press
• Year: 2016
• Print ISBN: 9780674737877
• eBook ISBN: 9780674972872
• Topic: Literature
• Subtopic: Literary Criticism in Poetry
• Index: Literature

Contemporary American poetry has plenty to offer new readers, and plenty more for those who already follow it. Yet its difficulty—and sheer variety—leaves many readers puzzled or overwhelmed. The critic, scholar, and poet Stephanie Burt sets out to help. Beginning in the early 1980s, where critical consensus ends, Burt canvasses American poetry of the past four decades, from the headline-making urgency of Claudia Rankine's Citizen to the stark pathos of Louise Glück, the limitless energy of Juan Felipe Herrera, and the erotic provocations of D. A. Powell.

The Poem Is You: Sixty Contemporary American Poems and How to Read Them is a guide to the diverse magnificences of American poetry today. It presents a wide range of poems selected by Burt for this volume, each accompanied by an original essay explaining how a given poem works, why it matters, and how the poem speaks to other parts of art and culture. Included here are some classroom classics (by Ashbery, Komunyakaa, Hass), less famous poems by very famous poets (Glück, Kay Ryan), and poems by prizewinning poets near the start of their careers (such as Brandon Som), and by others who are not—or not yet—well known.

The Poem Is You will appeal to poets, teachers, and students, but it is intended especially for readers who want to learn more about contemporary American poetry but who have not known where or how to start. It describes what American poets have fashioned for one another, and what they can give us today.

Index

• Abram, David, 190
• Abrams, M. H., 81
• Acker, Kathy, 229
• Action Books, 62
• adolescence, 106, 284–285, 339–341; early vs. late, 46–50; and fantasy, 97–98; in Hayes, 271, 273; as irresponsibility, 142–143
• adults and adulthood, 52, 58, 74, 149–151, 215, 260; and compromise, 52, 74; in Gay, 364, 368; in Gregerson, 149–151; in Hollander, 46, 49
• advertisements, 310, 313
• Aeolian harp, 48, 124
• African American literature and culture, 37, 164, 167–168, 269, 349, 367; and Black Arts Movement, 38–39; in 1930s and 1940s, 73–77; and Nuyorican culture, 25, 28; and racial passing, 219–220
• African American poetry, 6, 8–9; by Alexander, 218–222; by Bess, 336–342; by Clifton, 35–39; by Dove, 73–77; by Gay, 362–369; by Hayes, 268–273; and jazz, 60; by Komunyakaa, 83–87; by Mullen, 164–168; and Puerto Rican poets, 25
• agriculture. See farming and farm workers
• Ahmed, Sara, 351
• AIDS. See HIV/ AIDS
• Alaska, 327
• Alcalá, Rosa, 330–335; “Class,” 330–335; Undocumentaries, 332
• alcoholism, 180, 182
• Alexander, Elizabeth, 38, 218–222; The Black Interior, 221; “Race,” 218–222
• Ali, Agha Shahid, 3, 8, 57, 233–239; Call Me Ishmael Tonight, 234; The Country Without a Post Office, 235; Ravishing DisUnities, 235; “Tonight,” 233–239
• Ali, Kazim, 235
• Alighieri, Dante, 142, 271, 273, 297, 362, 369
• allegory, 3, 122, 283, 285, 312
• alliteration, 306
• alphabet, 8, 175, 304–306
• Altieri, Charles, 13, 120
• alt lit, 338, 340, 342
• Amherst, MA, 32, 236
• Ammons, A. R., 78–82, 208, 211, 264; Garbage, 78; “Motion’s Holding,” 81; The Really Short Poems of A. R. Ammons, 78; Sphere, 78; Sumerian Vistas, 81; “Target,” 78–82
• anaphora, 12, 197
• Angel Island, 3, 360–361
• Anglo–Saxon poetry, 206
• animals, 34, 90, 92–93, 316. See also individual animals
• anxiety, 323–324
• “A/ppeal A/pple A/dam A/dream” (Waldner), 223–227
• Arabic, 234, 238
• Aristotle, 44, 64, 261
• Arkansas, 186, 190
• Armantrout, Rae, 5, 6, 41, 156, 175, 213–217; “Falling: 1,” 217; “Our Nature,” 213–217; True, 217; Veil, 215–216
• Arnold, Matthew, 339
• ars poetica, 20, 26, 132, 162, 207, 246, 272, 364; and avant garde writing, 43; and lyric, 20, 364
• Arte Público Press, 8
• Art of the Sonnet, The (Burt and Mikics), 12
• Ashbery, John, 2, 4, 5, 7, 10, 17–21, 41, 273; “Farm Implements and Rutabagas in a Landscape,” 105; “Paradoxes and Oxymorons,” 10, 17–21, 41, 43, 129; “Purists Will Object,” 7; Shadow Train, 20, 47; “Untilted,” 20
• Ashton, Jennifer, 334
• Asian American poetry, 6, 8; by Shaughnessy, 343–347; by Som, 354–361; by Yau, 104–109
• Asian American Writers Workshop, 9, 14
• “Atlas of the Difficult World, An” (Rich), 126–130
• Auden, W. H., 15, 127, 351; “Have a Good Time,” 106, 107
• audience. See performance; readers
• autobiography, 8, 9, 39, 270; resistance to, 47, 108, 156, 216, 358
• automobiles, 74
• avant garde, 3, 8, 12, 14, 191; backgrounds in, 307, 334; and Grenier, 68, 70, 72; and 1980s, 6–7; vs. orality, 166. See also “experimental” writing; language writing
• “ ‘A Wooden Eye …’ ” (Goldbarth), 158–163
• Bang, Mary Jo, 303–307; “ABC Plus E,” 304; The Bride of E, 304; Elegy, 307; “Q Is for the Quick,” 303–307; “Z Is for Zero Hour,” 304
• Baraka, Amiri, 5, 37, 270, 273
• Barbauld, Anna Letitia, 343; “To an Invisible Being … ,” 343
• Baroque, 15, 95, 245–249, 298, 368
• “Bartleby the Scrivener” (Melville), 284–285
• basketball, 11, 349
• Bayles, Megan, 225
• BDSM. See masochism; sadism; sex and sexuality
• Beckett, Samuel, 307
• Bécquer, Gustavo Adolfo, 252–253
• Bedient, Calvin, 166, 278
• Bellwether, Mira, 312
• Benjamin, Jessica, 288
• Benjamin, Wal...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Contents
• Introduction
• John Ashbery, Paradoxes and Oxymorons (1981)
• Tato Laviera, tito madera smith (1981)
• Richard Wilbur, The Ride (1982)
• Lucille Clifton, my dream about the second coming (1982 / 1987)
• Carla Harryman, Possession (1982)
• John Hollander, Songs & Sonnets (1983)
• Carl Dennis, More Music (1984 / 1985)
• Liam Rector, Saxophone (1984)
• Czesław Miłosz, trans. Robert Pinsky and Czesław Miłosz, Incantation (1984)
• Robert Grenier, Shoe from the Waves (1984)
• Rita Dove, Lightnin’ Blues (1986)
• A. R. Ammons, Target (1987)
• Yusef Komunyakaa, Facing It (1987 / 1988)
• Diane Glancy, Hamatawk (1988 / 1991)
• Lucie Brock-Broido, Domestic Mysticism (1988)
• Killarney Clary, Above the Inland Empire today (1989)
• John Yau, Modern Love (1989)
• Robert Creeley, Oh (1990)
• Charles Wright, December Journal (1990)
• Allen Grossman, The Piano Player Explains Himself (1991)
• Adrienne Rich, An Atlas of the Difficult World XIII (Dedications) (1991)
• Louise Glück, Lamium (1992)
• James Merrill, Self-Portrait in Tyvek TM Windbreaker (1992 / 1995)
• Linda Gregerson, Salt (1993 / 1996)
• Kay Ryan, Emptiness (1993)
• Albert Goldbarth, “A Wooden Eye. An 1884 Silver Dollar. A Homemade Explosive. A Set of False Teeth. And a 14-Karat Gold Ashtray” (1995 / 1998)
• Harryette Mullen, honey jars of hair (1995)
• Stanley Kunitz, Halley’s Comet (1995)
• Michael Palmer, Letters to Zanzotto: Letter 3 (1995)
• Robert Hass, Our Lady of the Snows (1996)
• C. D. Wright, Key Episodes from an Earthly Life (1996)
• Juan Felipe Herrera, Blood on the Wheel (1999)
• Carter Revard, A Song That We Still Sing (2001)
• Allan Peterson, Epigraph (2001)
• Rae Armantrout, Our Nature (2001)
• Elizabeth Alexander, Race (2001)
• Liz Waldner, A / ppeal A / pple A / dam A / dream (2002)
• kari edwards, >> > >> > >> PLEASE FORWARD & > >> (2003)
• Agha Shahid Ali, Tonight (1996 / 2003)
• D. A. Powell, [when he comes he is neither sun nor shade: a china doll] (2004)
• Angie Estes, Sans Serif (2005)
• W. S. Merwin, To the Wires Overhead (2005 / 2007)
• Bernadette Mayer, On Sleep (2005)
• Donald Revell, Moab (2005 / 2007)
• Terrance Hayes, The Blue Terrance (2006)
• Jorie Graham, Futures (2007 / 2008)
• Laura Kasischke, Miss Weariness (2007)
• Frank Bidart, Song of the Mortar and Pestle (2008)
• Robyn Schiff, Lustron: The House America Has Been Waiting For (2008)
• Mary Jo Bang, Q Is for the Quick (2009)
• Lucia Perillo, Viagra (2009)
• Melissa Range, The Workhorse (2010)
• Joseph Massey, Prescription (2011)
• dg nanouk okpik, Date: Post Glacial (2012)
• Rosa Alcalá, Class (2012)
• Gabby Bess, Oversized T-Shirts (2012 / 2013)
• Brenda Shaughnessy, Hide-and-Seek with God (2012)
• Claudia Rankine, You and your partner go to see the film (2014)
• Brandon Som, Oulipo (2014)
• Ross Gay, Weeping (2015)
• Sources
• Further Reading
• Acknowledgments
• Credits
• Index