Contemporary American Poetry

You’re Not a Girl in a Movie is a new collection of powerful poems by Hala Alyan, winner of the Arab American Book Award in Poetry and the Dayton Literary Peace Prize. In these nine extraordinary poems, Alyan wrestles with the intimate themes that have driven her acclaimed body of work to date: the aching loss of homeland, the image and worth of women, and the violence of love. In Beirut, Brooklyn, and roads in the American West, she unravels the effects of decades of war and displacement on love and human worth and identity.

'Intelligent and unpretentious Modern Poetry for intelligent, unpretentious and modern-minded people.' Barn Swallow. In groups: a mad woman's hyperactive Tourette's tearing at her hair; her flailing fists, and rapid arm-weaving, everywhere and nowhere; alone: a Tartar's arrow-bolt ~ fletched with blue steel... This masterful collection brings exquisite high-art poetry to ordinarily educated readers. Each poem comes with a set of explanatory notes, written by the author himself; and this edition also includes an informative essay to explain what makes free-verse successful. The few technical...

Tense and emotional... ...extremely candid poetry. Why does poetry ask probing questions, evoke deep emotions, and elude monolithic explanations? This book is a time capsule of a young man searching for solutions while offering none. These poems represent a maturing mind attempting to understand life and one person's place in it. Poems are photographs of literature where the observer can extract more words from it with each viewing. A must-read for adolescents and young adults! Get it now.

By any measure, Ed Zahniser is one of the truest poets in America in this century. If you love mountain poetry and wilderness on the page, Adirondack Mountain & Cabin Poems is your next read. Ed Zahniser writes from the Adirondack cabin he's visited since the 1940s. Here is the mountain experience rendered by the poet’s words and beyond. Encounter the bird that reads the poet’s note on the tree and startles away. A harvest of wilderness after-thoughts, Ed’s mountains restore the reader time and again: Paper Birch Scribble scribble scribble idly on white birchbark Leave these on the ...

In his collection of poems, Musings of a Hermit, Charles (Chuck) Kausalik-Boe explores seeking the divine through the natural world, cats and chance encounters with others. From the solitude of his tiny inner city home, he watches and reflects on what passes by his porch windows. He also goes within to experience the magic that dwells in his heart and soul. From Chuck’s pen flows poetry that is both prayerful and filled with whimsy. Musings of a Hermit is a love song to the divine, the world around us, and to the magic that is possible.

With lively writing and illuminating examples, David Caplan argues that two characteristics mark the vast, contentious literature. On the one hand, several of America's major poets and critics claim that America needs a poetry equal to the country's distinctiveness. They advocate for novelty and for a break with what is perceived to be outmoded and foreign.

When the future of Grandeur nears the brink of collapse in the face of band rivalry, Tess finds to her chagrin that she must team up with Brandon in a desperate attempt to revive the company. As Tess and Brandon spend more time together, Tess begins to wonder if everything she thought she knew might not be so certain after all….

From the two-term Poet Laureate of the United States Billy Collins comes his first compilation of new and selected poems in 12 years. Aimless Love combines new poems with selections from four previous books— Nine Horses, The Trouble with Poetry, Ballistics, and Horoscopes for the Dead. Collins’s unmistakable voice, which brings together plain speech with imaginative surprise, is clearly heard with every word, reminding us how he has managed to enrich the tapestry of contemporary poetry and greatly expand its audience.

Library of Small Catastrophes, Alison Rollins's ambitious debut collection, interrogates the body and nation as storehouses of countless tragedies. Drawing from Jorge Luis Borges's fascination with the library, Rollins uses the concept of the archive to offer a lyric history of the ways in which we process loss. "Memory is about the future, not the past", she writes, and rather than shying away from the anger, anxiety, and mourning of her narrators, Rollins's poetry seeks to challenge the status quo.

'Intelligent but unpretentious rhyming poetry for intelligent but unpretentious people.' Queenly Kitten, Rosette of Snows Where few dirty mortals go; Why did God grant pretty grace To a perfect killer’s face? The time is right - and the reading public craves - for a return to rhyming poetry that is both understandable to all but also 'aristocratic' in its artistic standards. When you read this poetry, you will feel as empowered as a prince. The user-friendly edition also comes with poem-by-poem explanatory notes by the author himself, an essay which defines traditional rhyming poetry in ...

Enter the dark and twisted world of G.R. Tomaini, a contemporary Poet, Philosopher, Systematic Theologian, and author of nine books who explores the depths of human depravity, despair, and decadence. In The Psalms of Babylon, you will find 112 Flowers of Malaise that will shock, disturb, and fascinate you. You will encounter seductive sirens, hungry hogs, unholy grins, and laughing gas. You will visit opium dens, woodchippers, bathtubs, and tombs. You will witness sin, surf, seance, and soliloquy. You will experience asphyxiation, jouissance, Ragnarok, and metanoia. The Psalms of Babylon ...

Prepare to be immersed in the heart and soul of African American poetry; a vital cornerstone of American literature that transcends borders and communities worldwide. African American poets have an unparalleled ability to celebrate their heritage by forging deep connections across the vast African Diaspora. Their craft is a unique tradition, intricately woven with the rhythms of jazz, the pulse of hip-hop, the soul of rhythm and blues, and the energy of rock and roll. These verses resonate with the echoes of churches, the camaraderie of barbershops, and the vibrancy of urban life. Dive into...

"Where are you from . . . ? No—where are you from from?" It's a question every Asian American gets asked as part of an incessant chorus saying you'll never belong here, you're a perpetual foreigner, you'll always be seen as an alien, an object, or a threat. Monica Youn's From From brilliantly evokes the conflicted consciousness of deracination. If you have no core of "authenticity," no experience of your so-called homeland, how do you piece together an Asian American identity out of Westerners' ideas about Asians? Your sense of yourself is part stereotype, part aspiration, part guilt.

In times of crisis, one needs to stop and ask, “How did we get here?” Our contemporary chaos is the result of a society built upon pervasive systems of oppression, discrimination and violence that run deeper and reach further than most understand or care to realize. These draconian systems have been fundamental to many aspects of our lives, and we seem to have gradually allowed them more power. However, our foundation is not solid; it is fractured and collapsing – if we allow that. We need to start applying new models of interpretation and analysis to the deep-rooted problems at hand....

This collection of poems presents a unique perspective on enduring themes--love, existentialism, the darker side of life in an urban environment, loneliness, quiet heroism and the transcendent power of poetry to rebuild weary souls and teach lessons we may not want to learn. Although several of the poems in this collection have appeared in anthologies and literary magazines, most are published here for the first time and represent a selection of the author's free verse, blank verse, and sonnets from early adulthood through middle age (1977-2006). The author is a Professor of Legal Studies ...

Passionate and evocative, "Love Letters to Sophie’s Mom" traces a relationship from the first dance of love at a coffee shop to its tragic demise as mental illness overtakes the narrator’s beloved. Inspired by a diverse array of writings, including the verse of Pablo Neruda, Dylan Thomas, and Bob Dylan, the collection’s 34 poems touch upon an array of themes including nature, and Southern California and Northwoods motifs.

In times of crisis, one needs to stop and ask, “How did we get here?” Our contemporary chaos is the result of a society built upon pervasive systems of oppression, discrimination and violence that run deeper and reach further than most understand or care to realize. These draconian systems have been fundamental to many aspects of our lives, and we seem to have gradually allowed them more power. However, our foundation is not solid; it is fractured and collapsing – if we allow that. We need to start applying new models of interpretation and analysis to the deep-rooted problems at hand....

Poetry can sometimes be elusive, the real meaning layered beneath another. In this volume American poets give voice to their nation, their hopes, and their aspirations. Whitman, Emerson, and Dickinson are joined by Poe, Holmes, Dunbar, and others to pleasure our ears and minds with a rambling stroll through their works. It doesn’t define America, but it captures her mood and the flavours of her soul in the early days of the American dream.

Bread and Circus is a hybrid and palimpsestic memoir-in-verse: it combines poetry, photography and spectral imagining to explore the realities of economic necessity and marginal poverty through a personal lens. Examining the experience of the US urban Black community from a variety of perspectives, it draws heavily on the author’s archival research on Adam Smith, the eighteenth-century Scottish economist, as well as his magnum opus, The Wealth of Nations.

The Home of the World is an exquisite poetic and philosophical journey through the perplexities of existence in relationship with the natural world and the divine. Each poem blends unique imagery with philosophical reflections that resonate deeply. The first poem in the collection, "Song of Light," explores themes of loss and longing through the symbolism of the Sun and nature. The poignant plea for restoration motivates readers to examine their relationship with the world. In the "Song in the Garden," the poet's voice is gentle and encourages appreciation of life's little pleasures that we...