Popular Poetry Books for Adults
Hundreds of books are added to the Library's collection each month. Here are the most popular Poetry books for adults.
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The Renegade: Writings on Poetry and A Few Other Things
In these essays, Charles Simic delves into the lives and work of poets, novelists, artists, and playwrights, beginning with his own experiences before turning to those of Christopher Marlowe, Odilon Redon, W. S. Sebald, Louise Glu¨ck, and many more. Throughout he celebrates the renegade spirit, whether it inspires a rogue ant to depart from his prescribed path or a poet to write unfashionably honest verse.Simic brings the personal worlds of each writer and artist to life, discussing their friends, homes, influences, and the rooms that shaped their outlooks. His portraits urge the reader to regard writers and artists as protean, fallible men and women rather than as immutable icons, and he reveals the key turning points in the creative lives of his subjects, noting their creative failures as often as he does their successes. He is unflinching in his analyses of even the most beloved cultural figures, following his enthralling praises with unforgettable, piercing critiques. (syndetics)
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Meditations in An Emergency
Collected poems from one of the Twentieth Century's most influential voices. Frank O'Hara was one of the great poets of the twentieth century and, along with such widely acclaimed writers as Denise Levertov, Allen Ginsberg, Robert Creeley, and Gary Snyder, a crucial contributor to what Donald Allen termed the New American Poetry, "which, by its vitality alone, became the dominant force in the American poetic tradition." Frank O'Hara was born in Baltimore in 1926 and grew up in New England; from 1951 he lived and worked in New York, both for Art News and for the Museum of Modern Art, where he was an associate curator. O'Hara's untimely death in 1966 at the age of forty was, in the words of fellow poet John Ashbery, "the biggest secret loss to American poetry since John Wheelwright was killed.". This collection is a reissue of a volume first published by Grove Press in 1957, and it demonstrates beautifully the flawless rhythm underlying O'Hara's conviction that to write poetry, indeed to live, "you just go on your nerve." (syndetics)
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The Penguin Anthology of Twentieth-century American Poetry
Penguin proudly presents an unparalleled survey of the best poems of the past century. Rita Dove, Pulitzer Prize-winning poet and former U .S. Poet Laureate, introduces readers to the most significant and compelling poems of the past hundred years. Selecting from the canon of American poetry throughout the twentieth century, Dove has created an anthology that represents the full spectrum of aesthetic sensibilities-from styles and voices to themes and cultures-while balancing important poems with significant periods of each poet. Featuring poems both classic and contemporary, this collection reflects both a dynamic and cohesive portrait of modern American poetry and outlines its trajectory over the past century. (syndetics)
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The Dream of A Common Language: Poems, 1974-1977
"Rich's poems do not demand the willing suspension of disbelief. They demand belief, and it is a measure of her success as a poet that most of the time they get it. . . . The affirmation and the occasional moments of pure joy in these poems are quiet but fully earned."--Margaret Atwood, New York Times Book Review (syndetics)
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Dream Work
Dream Work, a collection of forty-five poems, follows both chronologically and logically Mary Oliver's American primitive, which won for her the Pulitzer Prize for the finest book of poetry published in 1983 by an American poet. The depth and diversity of perceptual awareness--so steadfast and radiant in American primitive--continue in Dream work. Additionally, she has turned her attention in these poems to the solitary and difficult labors of the spirit--to accepting the truth about one's personal world, and to valuing the triumphs while transcending the failures of human relationships. Whether by way of inheritance--as in her poem about the Holocaust--or through a painful glimpse into the present--as in "Acid," a poem about an injured boy begging in the streets of Indonesia--the events and tendencies of history take on a new importance also. More deeply than in her previous volumes, the sensibility behind these poems has merged with the world. Mary Oliver's willingness to be joyful continues, deepened by self-awareness, by experience, and by choice.
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The Crown Ain't Worth Much
The Crown Ain't Worth Much, Hanif Abdurraqib's first full-length collection, is a sharp and vulnerable portrayal of city life in the United States. A regular columnist for MTV.com, Abdurraqib brings his interest in pop culture to these poems, analyzing race, gender, family, and the love that finally holds us together even as it threatens to break us. Terrance Hayes writes that Abdurraqib "bridges the bravado and bling of praise with the blood and tears of elegy." The poems in this collection are challenging and accessible at once, as they seek to render real human voices in moments of tragedy and celebration. (syndetics)
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The Whiskey of Our Discontent: Gwendolyn Brooks as Conscience and Change Agent
Winner of the 2017 Central New York Book Award for nonfiction Finalist for the 2017 Chicago Review of Books Award The first black woman to be named United States poet laureate, Brook's poetry, fiction, and social commentary shed light on the beauty of humanity, the distinct qualities of black life and community, and the destructive effects of racism, sexism, and class inequality. A collection of thirty essays combining critical analysis and personal reflection,The Whiskey of Our Discontent, presents essential elements of Brooks' oeuvre--on race, gender, class, community, and poetic craft, while also examining her life as poet, reporter, mentor, sage, activist, and educator. (syndetics)
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The Sun and Her Flowers
Watch rupi kaur live now on Prime Video. "Rupi Kaur is the Writer of the Decade." -- The New Republic From rupi kaur, the #1 New York Times bestselling author of milk and honey , comes her long-awaited second collection of poetry. A vibrant and transcendent journey about growth and healing. Ancestry and honoring one's roots. Expatriation and rising up to find a home within yourself. Divided into five chapters and illustrated by kaur, the sun and her flowers is a journey of wilting, falling, rooting, rising, and blooming. A celebration of love in all its forms. this is the recipe of life said my mother as she held me in her arms as i wept think of those flowers you plant in the garden each year they will teach you that people too must wilt fall root rise in order to bloom (syndetics)
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Leaves of Grass
Presents the major literary works of America's poet of democracy, including "Song of Myself," "Starting from Paumanok," "I Sing the Body Electric," "Song of the Open Road," and "Out of the Cradle Endlessly Rocking."
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Oceanic
"Nezhukumatathil's poems contain elegant twists of a very sharp knife. She writes about the natural world and how we live in it, filling each poem, each page with a true sense of wonder." -- Roxane Gay "Cultural strands are woven into the DNA of her strange, lush... poems. Aphorisms...from another dimension." -- The New York Times "With unparalleled ease, she's able to weave each intriguing detail into a nuanced, thought-provoking poem that also reads like a startling modern-day fable." -- The Poetry Foundation "How wonderful to watch a writer who was already among the best young poets get even better!" -- Terrance Hayes With inquisitive flair, Aimee Nezhukumatathil creates a thorough registry of the earth's wonderful and terrible magic. In her fourth collection of poetry, she studies forms of love as diverse and abundant as the ocean itself. She brings to life a father penguin, a C-section scar, and the Niagara Falls with a powerful force of reverence for life and living things. With an encyclopedic range of subjects and unmatched sincerity, Oceanic speaks to each reader as a cooperative part of the earth, an extraordinary neighborhood to which we all belong. From "Starfish and Coffee": And that's how you feel after tumbling like sea stars on the ocean floor over each other. A night where it doesn't matter which are arms or which are legs or what radiates and how-- only your centers stuck together. Aimee Nezhukumatathil is the author of four collections of poetry. Recipient of a National Endowment for the Arts fellowship and the prestigious Eric Hoffer Grand Prize, Nezhukumatathil teaches creative writing and environmental literature in the MFA program at the University of Mississippi. (syndetics)
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