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Wonderland: Poems
by Matthew DickmanLuminous and hypnotic, this dynamic collection explores the dark edges of childhood, violence, race, class, and masculinity, by one of the most fearless poets of his generation. "Known for poems of universality of feeling, expressive lyricism of reflection, and heartrending allure" (Major Jackson), award-winning poet Matthew Dickman returns with a collection that engages the traces of his own living past, suffusing these poems with ghosts of longing, shame, and vulnerability. In the southeast Portland neighborhood of Dickman’s youth, parents are out of control and children are in chaos. With grief, anger, and, ultimately, understanding, Dickman confronts a childhood of ambient violence, well-intentioned but warped family relations, confining definitions of identity, and the deprivation of this particular Portland neighborhood in the 1980s. Wonderland reminds us that, while these neighborhoods are filled with guns, skateboards, fights, booze, and heroin, and home to punk rockers, skinheads, poor kids, and single moms, they are also places of innocence and love.
Woods and Chalices
by Tomaz Salamun HenryInspired by Rimbaud and Ashbery, the Slovenian poet Tomaž Šalamun is now inspiring the younger generation of American poets-and Woods and Chalices will secure his place in the ranks of influential, experimental twenty-first-century writers. Šalamun's strengths are on display here: innocence and obscenity, closely allied; a great historical reach; and questions, commands, and statements of identity that challenge all norms and yet seem uncannily familiar and right- "I'm molasses, don't forget that." Coat of ArmsThe wet sun stands on dark bricks.Through the king's mouth we see teeth.He sews lips. The owl moves its head.She's tired, drowsy and black.She doesn't glow in gold like she'd have to.
The Woods Are On Fire: New and Selected Poems (Ted Kooser Contemporary Poetry)
by Fleda Brown Ted KooserThe Woods Are On Fire is Fleda Brown’s deeply human and intensely felt poetic explorations of her life and world. Her account includes her brain-damaged brother, a rickety family cottage, a puzzling and sometimes frightening father, a timid mother, and the adult life that follows with its loves, divorces, and serious illnesses. Visually and emotionally rich, Brown’s poems call on Einstein, Shakespeare, Sophocles, Law and Order, Elvis, and Beethoven. They stand before the Venus de Milo as well as the moon, as they measure distances between what we make as art and who we are as humans. In wide-ranging forms—from the sestina to prose poems—they focus on the natural world as well as the Delaware legislature and the inauguration of William Jefferson Clinton.The Woods Are On Fire includes nearly fifty new poems, along with poems selected from seven previous books, showcasing an influential American poet’s work over the last few decades.
Woodshedding
by S. E. VenartLonglisted for the 2008 ReLit Awards Whatever their subject -- the unwinding of lovers, childhood as the foundation of being, the metaphorical life of everyday objects and events -- S.E. Venart's poems show us a kind of courage that is quotidian. Surviving childhood, surviving failed love, finding solace in the self, and reinvigorating that self: this is the world Venart reveals to us, in all its prescient detail. A honest and lyrical first book.
Woodstock, Baby!: A Far-Out Counting Book
by Spencer WilsonA far-out counting board book celebrating the peace and love of Woodstock!Little rockers will love counting everything from peace signs and guitars to bell-bottoms and rock bands in this out-of-sight board book with simple rhyming words and groovy illustrations. It's the perfect gift for every little flower child and music fan.
Word betaal vir jou gedigte
by Elmarié Smal Bernard LevineSkryf jy gedigte? Nou, kan jy betaal word vir die gedigte wat jy skryf en dit kan ook gepubliseer word in kaartjies, kalenders, plakkate en muurbehangsels. As jy jou skrywersdrome wil bewaarheid en terselfder tyd ook vergoed word vir jou gedigte, is hierdie unieke boek spesiaal vir jou. Om gedigte te skryf vir geld is groot pret en baie winsgewend! Word betaal om te doen waarvan jy hou.
Word Comix: Poems
by Charlie Smith"Smith writes with a scalding aortal brilliance that leaves the reader drunk on dream."--New York Times Book Review Taking as his starting point such wide-ranging subjects as comic books, politics, romantic love, geology, newspapers, totalitarianism, the natural world, the classics, Paris, Miami Beach, and war, Charlie Smith has written freshly realized poems in which compassion and tough-mindedness gesture toward wisdom.
Word Made Fresh: An Invitation to Poetry for the Church
by Abram Van EngenHave you ever read a book that turned your world upside down? What about a poem? Poetry has the power to enliven, challenge, change, and enrich our lives. But it can also feel intimidating, confusing, or simply &“not for us.&” In these joyful and wise reflections, Abram Van Engen shows readers how poetry is for everyone—and how it can reinvigorate our Christian faith. Intertwining close readings with personal storytelling, Van Engen explains how and why to read poems as a spiritual practice. Far from dry, academic instruction, his approach encourages readers to delight in poetry, even as they come to understand its form. He also opens up the meaning of poetry and parables in Scripture, revealing the deep connection between literature and theology. Word Made Fresh is more than a guide to poetry—it&’s an invitation to wonder, to speak up, to lament, to praise. Including dozens of poems from diverse authors, this book will inspire curious and thoughtful readers to see God and God&’s creation in surprising new ways.
Word of Mouth: Gossip and American Poetry (Hopkins Studies in Modernism)
by Chad BennettThe first study of modern and contemporary poetry’s vibrant exchange with gossip.Can the art of gossip help us to better understand modern and contemporary poetry? Gossip’s ostensible frivolity may seem at odds with common conceptions of poetry as serious, solitary expression. But in Word of Mouth, Chad Bennett explores the dynamic relationship between gossip and American poetry, uncovering the unexpected ways that the history of the modern lyric intertwines with histories of sexuality in the twentieth century. Through nuanced readings of Gertrude Stein, Langston Hughes, Frank O’Hara, and James Merrill—poets who famously absorbed and adapted the loose talk that swirled about them and their work—Bennett demonstrates how gossip became a vehicle for alternative modes of poetic practice. By attending to gossip’s key role in modern and contemporary poetry, he recognizes the unpredictable ways that conventional understandings of the modern lyric poem have been shaped by, and afforded a uniquely suitable space for, the expression of queer sensibilities.Evincing an ear for good gossip, Bennett presents new and illuminating queer contexts for the influential poetry of these four culturally diverse poets. Word of Mouth establishes poetry as a neglected archive for our thinking about gossip and contributes a crucial queer perspective to current lyric studies and its renewed scholarly debate over the status and uses of the lyric genre.
Word of Mouth: Poems Featured on NPR's All Things Considered
by Catherine BowmanStarting in 1995, NPR's All Things Considered began presenting poets reading their own works. Introduced by "poetry DJ" Catherine Bowman, these popular short segments allowed listeners to experience poetry as a kind of verbal music, recalling its roots as a spoken art form. Word of Mouth, edited by Bowman, brings together the poems that have been featured on NPR, providing a window onto the dynamic contemporary poetry scene. A child playing with flashes of sunlight in the aisle of an airplane; a woman describing tropical fruit to someone in a faraway country; a man building a deck with his dead father's hammer; the musings of a Barbie doll participating in a 12-step program: these poems powerfully and lyrically transform the stuff of every day life. A celebration of the poetic voice that includes 33 acclaimed writers, this vibrant anthology proves beyond any doubt that poetry is far more than just words on paper. Quincy Troupe * Czeslaw Milosz * Campbell McGrath * C. D. Wright * Jack Gilbert * Heather McHugh * David Lehman * Wang Ping * Joseph Brodsky * Paul Beatty * Lorna Dee Cervantes * Paul Muldoon * Lucille Clifton * Naomi Shihab Nye * Richard Blanco * Albert Goldbarth * Carrie Allen McCray * Belle Waring * Russell Edson * Kevin Young * Nuali Di Dhomhnaill * Charles Harper Webb * Denise Duhamel * Yusef Komunyakaa * Hal Sirowitz * Lucia Perillo * Amy Gerstler * Maura Stanton * Marilyn Chin * Philip Booth * Jane Cooper * Diane DiPrima * Elizabeth Spires
Word Unheard: A Guide Through Eliot's Four Quartets
by Harry BlamiresEliot’s Four Quartets is arguably the finest long poem in modern English literature. It is also one that presents considerable problems of interpretation. In Word Unheard, first published in 1969, Blamires aims to unravel some of these problems by guiding the reader line by line through the poem, blending paraphrase with commentary. Blamires pays particular attention to the philosophical and theological dimensions of the poem and to its multifarious personal, historical and literary allusions. This title will be of interests to students of literature.
Word Warriors: 35 Women Leaders in the Spoken Word Revolution
by Alix Olson Eve EnslerFemale spoken word artists have become the spokeswomen for a new generation. This demanding oral poetry of the early 21st century has defined a vanguard of lithely muscled voices; women who think and act decisively to create their distinctive and desperately earned realities. The combination of the eminent slam movement and the upsurge of bold underground feminism has created a unique pool of women who verbally challenge society on all fronts.Editor Alix Olson (internationally touring spoken word artist-activist) brought together a variety of astounding spoken word artists for Word Warriors. Included in this collection are Patricia Smith and Eileen Myles, two of our most formidable spoken-word foremothers, Tony-award winners Sarah Jones, Suheir Hammad and Staceyann Chin, recording artists Bitch and Lynn Breedlove from the dyke-punk band Tribe 8, award-winning writer Michelle Tea, and many more. These women join other amazing artists from many different backgrounds to create Word Warriors, a powerful and comprehensive collection of work from the best and brightest female spoken word artists today.
Words
by Arnold MatthewsThe author, Arnold Matthews, hopes you will find in this package of his written works of poetry, much pleasure. The poetry is addressed to all faiths and none, to all gender orientations and to Humanitarians. Of course, not all poetry appeals to everyone but as stated in the Doctor’s Magazine ‘The Lancet’, it says that the right sort of poetry can be very therapeutic. It is for the reader to judge if this is the ‘right sort of poetry’. The author invites the recipients of his work to select the material to which they can personally relate, and perhaps re-read from time to time, so that like a song, the impact of new concepts will be revealed and will bring growing joy and understanding, even revelation to the reader.
Words Before Dawn: Poems
by William WentheWilliam Wenthe's third collection begins in the domestic realm then moves outward in subject and place -- to a bird market in Paris, the Jaffa Gate in Old Jerusalem, the Chain Bridge in Budapest -- before returning to the familial. The poet recalls his own cherished experiences of fatherhood: rocking his infant daughter in the early morning, lying with her outside on a pink flannel sheet, and watching her joyous reaction to the sight of roses. While actively engaged in the artist's struggle to represent reality, Wenthe draws attention to the particular, to moments and events that seem to exist beyond thoughts and words. In "Uhte," Wenthe reflects on the Old English name for the hour before dawn: "that word / has haunted me -- wondering how that hour / had first called forth a need / to be distinguished by a sound."In well-crafted free verse, traditional meter and rhyme, prose poems, and nonce forms, Wenthe meditates on family, language, art, history, and the natural world, striving to find words to capture the richness of life.
Words for Empty and Words for Full
by Bob HicokBob Hicok is associate professor of English at Virginia Tech University. He is the author of This Clumsy Living, Insomnia Diary, Animal Soul (a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award, ) Plus Shipping, and The Legend of Light. Hicok is the recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship, two NEA Fellowships, the Rebekah Johnson Bobbitt National Poetry Prize from the Library of Congress, the Felix Pollak Prize, the Jerome J. Shestack Prize, and four Pushcart Prizes. His poems have appeared in five volumes of Best American Poetry
Words for the Wind: The Collected Verse of Theodore Roethke
by Theodore RoethkeA collection of the Northwest poet's work up until 1958, which won the National Book Award in 1959. Roethke taught poetry and writing at the University of Washington.
Words for Trees
by Barbara FolkartIn this Ottawa writer’s first volume of verse, there are trees, of coursecatalpas on stained-glass transoms, an ever-present crabappel, nameless species in whose bare branches the winter solstice lurks. There is music, tooa whorehouse tango, a string quartet enthralling a favourite cat, the silky caress of a clarinet along the remembered flesh of adolescence. And visual art, from the Middle Ages through Matisse, is reenacted in vignettes of desire or dereliction.
Words From the Garden: A Collection of Beautiful Poetry, Prose and Quotations
by Isobel CarlsonThis beautiful collection of poetry and prose through the seasons rhapsodises on the spectacle of colour and everything green and flourishing in the garden. The perfect book for a moment’s reflection, whether you are cooped up on a rainy day in your potting shed or admiring the fruits of your labour on a sunny evening from the pergola.
Words From the Garden: A Collection of Beautiful Poetry, Prose and Quotations
by Isobel CarlsonThis beautiful collection of poetry and prose through the seasons rhapsodises on the spectacle of colour and everything green and flourishing in the garden. The perfect book for a moment’s reflection, whether you are cooped up on a rainy day in your potting shed or admiring the fruits of your labour on a sunny evening from the pergola.
Words in Air: The Complete Correspondence Between Elizabeth Bishop and Robert Lowell
by Elizabeth Bishop Robert LowellRobert Lowell once remarked in a letter to Elizabeth Bishop that "you ha[ve] always been my favorite poet and favorite friend." The feeling was mutual. Bishop said that conversation with Lowell left her feeling "picked up again to the proper table-land of poetry," and she once begged him, "Please never stop writing me letters—they always manage to make me feel like my higher self (I've been re-reading Emerson) for several days." Neither ever stopped writing letters, from their first meeting in 1947 when both were young, newly launched poets until Lowell's death in 1977. Presented in Words in Air is the complete correspondence between Bishop and Lowell. The substantial, revealing—and often very funny—interchange that they produced stands as a remarkable collective achievement, notable for its sustained conversational brilliance of style, its wealth of literary history, its incisive snapshots and portraits of people and places, and its delicious literary gossip, as well as for the window it opens into the unfolding human and artistic drama of two of America's most beloved and influential poets.
Words in Your Face: A Guided Tour Through Twenty Years of the New York City Poetry Slam
by Cristin O'Keefe AptowiczWords in Your Face traces the rich history of slam poetry through the lens of the New York City scene that pioneered it. Author Cristin O'Keefe Aptowicz situates New York slam poetry in the history of oral tradition in poetry throughout history and around the world, with particular attention to the three major 20th century arts movements that helped set the stage for it: the Harlem Renaissance, the Beats, and hip hop. Aptowicz explores the birth of slam at the Nuyorican Poets’ Café and the genre’s explosive growth as the media responded with events like Lollapalooza and MTV’s Unplugged. The book expands the canvas by examining the connections between academia and slammers, especially the poets of color, the youth slammers, and the burgeoning hip hop poetry scene. Interviews with key players like Chicago’s Marc Smith and San Francisco’s Gary Mex Glazner help tell this fascinating story from the inside.
Words like Thunder: New and Used Anishinaabe Prayers (Made in Michigan Writers Series)
by Lois BeardsleeWords like Thunder: New and Used Anishinaabe Prayers is a collection of poetry by award-winning Ojibwe author Lois Beardslee. Much of the book centers around Native people of the Great Lakes but has a universal relevance to modern indigenous people worldwide. Beardslee tackles contemporary topics like climate change and socioeconomic equality with a grace and readability that empowers readers and celebrates the strengths of today’s indigenous peoples. She transforms the mundane into the sacred. Similar in style to Nikki Giovanni, Beardslee might lure in readers with the promise of traditional cultural material, even stereotypes, before quickly pivoting toward a direction of respect for the contemporaneity and adaptability of indigenous people’s tenacious hold on traditions. Made up of four sections, the book is like a piece of artwork. Parts of the word-canvas are quiet so the reader can rest and other parts lead the reader quickly from one place to another, while always maintaining eye contact. More than anything, Beardslee emphasizes the notion that indigenous peoples are competent and wonderful, worthy of praise, and whose modernity is a function of their survival. She writes unapologetically with a strong ethnic identity as a woman of color who witnessed and experienced community loss of resources that defined her culture. Her stories transcend generations, time, and geographical boundaries—varying in voice between first person or that of her elders or children—resulting in a collective appeal. Beardslee continues to break the mold and push the boundaries of contemporary Native American poetry and prose. This book will appeal to a general readership, to people who want to learn more about indigenous peoples of the Great Lakes, and to people who care about the environment and socioeconomic equality. Even young readers, especially students of color, will find parts of this book to which they can relate.
Words of a Goat Princess
by Jessie ReyezA moving poetic debut from a talented artist, Words of a Goat Princess is everything you love about singer/songwriter Jessie Reyez—her rawness, her love affair with the ugly truths of humanity, and so much more.Words of a Goat Princess is the debut poetry collection about life’s struggle and triumphs from Grammy-nominated and JUNO-award winning songwriter Jessie Reyez.With the authenticity and heartbreaking relatability that her fans know and love her for, Reyez brings the breadth of her lived experience to the page as few recording artists can. At times ethereal and visceral, these 43 poems are carefully painted moments that expertly explore love, loss, and identity with an artistry that leaps off the page with every turn.Through this collection of poems and stories, Jessie Reyez shows that she is more than a pop performer, she is a true artist whose star knows no limits.
Words of Life: Poems and Essays
by Ann ChiappettaIn this new collection of poems, essays, and flash fiction, the author once again exhibits her ability to write about both the light and dark sides of life. There are numerous poems and stories about nature: its kindness, cruelty, and wonder. There are frank expressions of the sadness and frustration she felt at the progressive loss of her eyesight and a poem about the social isolation that disability can bring. Other pieces, though, sing of joys as diverse as family closeness, the love of dogs, the delights of scents, and the power of the muse. Just as in her first volume of poetry, Upwelling: Poems (2016), there is no fluff here. To read Ann Chiappetta’s works is to feel them deeply, appreciate them mightily, and remember them forever. From the IntroductionWhile it is my hope that all the pieces in this book resonate with my readers, I have my favorites. Some of the poems have been previously published; all reflect what lies within. This volume is accented with a few photographs. As I lose the last vestiges of my vision, bringing a meaningful visual array to this collection seems imperative. Finally, dear reader, I want to share the prose that reflects the way I’ve lived my creative life. If just one poem or essay resonates with you, I have accomplished the purpose. For a moment, as the eye reads and the brain interprets, the reader slips into the shoes of the writer. This is the true spirit of what it means to be creative, open, to offer the emotions in such a way as to give another person the opportunity to appreciate the writer’s experience with the words of life.