poetry books 2005

I may have overlooked some, but these are the poetry books I got this year. I put the five that really knocked me out separately at the top, not in any order. Five stars all around. The rest follow.

Study for the World’s Body – David St. John.
Complete Posthumous Poetry – Cesar Vallejo. Among my favorite poems here is “The Gravest Moment in Life.”
Trouble in Mind – Lucie Brock-Broido
ILL LIT – Franz Wright. I’m sold.
Vier Fragen der Melancholie – Tomas Salamun. I should have gotten this in English, but so be it. I think I still will get it in English. But the little German hardback is beautiful.

4 Stars
-The Master Letters – Lucie Brock-Broido. Very terrific, but not as terrific as “Trouble in Mind.”
-Poem of the Deep Song – Federico Garcia Lorca. This would have made it to the upper eschelon list, but I was familiar with most of it already, so my socks stayed on.
-Fire & Flower – Laura Kasischke. At times rapt, and even thrilling. You must read the “Barney” poem.
-First Four Book of Poems – W.S. Merwin. Of the poems in this volume, I already had “The Lice” and his previous “Selected Poems,” but this is essential stuff. I’ll enjoy it my whole life.
-The Body Electric (anth. of American Poetry Journal). This was a find – used bookstore in Philly. I discovered a bunch of poets I hadn’t read before, including SJ Marks and Norman Dubie, whose poem “Hummingbirds” almost shot this into the upper eschelon.
-Selected Poems and Prose of Paul Celan – I had much of this already, but in German. Good to have the bilingual edition.

Stars-n-Stripes
-Selected Poems – Carol Ann Duffy. This was worth it simply for the poem titled “$.”
-Candy Necklace – Cal Bedient. Vivid and imaginative, if hard to warm up to.
-Postmodern American Poetry – a Norton Anthology. Don’t know yet.
-Of This Time – Gerald Stern
-Pittsburgh Book of Contemporary American Poetry. This is a nice selection. What bugs me is how they have these full-page photos of the poets and suddenly I’m reading the poems with the face in my head and it disturbs the whole thing like a grimy filter. It doesn’t matter if they’re beautiful or homely. Some big names here (Kooser, Olds, Soto) and some folks I hadn’t heard of. I especially liked the Leonard Nathan poems. I like any poet who can get away with naming him/herself in the poem. That’s not easy.
-Voice Over – Elaine Equi. Don’t ask me how but I ordered this second-hand on Amazon and it came signed by Equi. I like her style.
-Selected Poems, Giuseppe Ungaretti. This was a gift from Carlo. It’s pretty good. Need to spend more time with it.
-The Wild Iris – Louise Glück. I really dig her, but it is true that sometimes the poems start to sound a lot like each other. Many of them are named “Matins.” I wonder about doing that.
-Repair – CK Williams. Haven’t really gotten into this.
-Passing Measures – Peter Riley. Riley does wonderful place poems. There are some excellent poems at these websites. http://jacketmagazine.com/02/riley02.html
http://www.nd.edu/~ndr/issues/ndr13/riley/songs.html
-New and Selected Poems - Stephen Dunn. Need to spend more time here.
-Figures of the Human - David Ignatow. I really like him. Very original.
-Carnival Evening – Linda Pastan. This wasn’t as good as I expected.
-Nine Horses – Billy Collins. I wouldn’t have, but this was going at Borders for $3.99.
-Outside History – Eavan Boland. Used bookstore buy in London. Doesn’t grab me.
-Subhuman Redneck Poems – Les Murray. He’s great.
-Forward Book of Poetry 2004. A British gathering. Lukewarm on this.