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Read These Poems Out Loud
Strange but ok
as always...
Mary Oliver- Great Poet
She Is A Sublime Witness To The Natural World!

New and Selected Poems: Volume One
Mary Oliver
Manufacturer: Beacon Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0807068772

Book Description

Strikingly redesigned to accompany the publication of New and Selected Poems, Volume Two When New and Selected Poems, Volume One was originally published in 1992, Mary Oliver was awarded the National Book Award. In the fourteen years since its initial appearance it has become one of the best-selling volumes of poetry in the country. This collection features thirty poems published only in this volume as well as selections from the poet's first eight books. Mary Oliver's perceptive, brilliantly crafted poems about the natural landscape and the fundamental questions of life and death have won high praise from critics and readers alike. "Do you love this world?" she interrupts a poem about peonies to ask the reader. "Do you cherish your humble and silky life?" She makes us see the extraordinary in our everyday lives, how something as common as light can be "an invitation/to happiness,/and that happiness,/when it's done right,/is a kind of holiness,/palpable and redemptive." She illuminates how a near miss with an alligator can be the catalyst for seeing the world "as if for the second time/the way it really is." Oliver's passionate demonstrations of delight are powerful reminders of the bond between every individual, all living things, and the natural world.

Customer Reviews:

Read These Poems Out Loud.......2007-04-09

Here is a book with a soul. Read these poems out loud, slowly. Let the music resonate between your ears. Linger on each line. Let each stanza stand alone. Who but Mary Oliver can ask:

Is the soul solid, like iron?
Or is it tender and breakable, like
the wings of a moth in the beak of an owl?

Oliver will take you to places light and dark, hopeful and hopeless, and you will remember them for a long time.

Strange but ok.......2007-02-24

I am not into poetry much, but there are some nice ones in here...strange/disturbing ones too, but the book as a whole is ok.

as always..........2007-02-07

Mary Oliver is one of my favorite poets and she did not diappoint with her work here. With each line, it is like I am being fed an exotic dessert, it awakens all of my senses to something new.

Mary Oliver- Great Poet.......2007-01-13

There may be a better poet than Mary Oliver alive today but I do not know who it is. Every one of her poems touches not only my soul but that of everyone I know who has heard her.

She Is A Sublime Witness To The Natural World!.......2005-12-16

Mary Oliver overwhelms my visual and auditory senses with her language; it is precise and controlled; her imagery is brilliant. Using carefully chosen words she captures the "essence" of living things in the natural world.

Each work is masterful and seems a deep meditation that leaves a reader feeling refreshed and somehow privy to a personal, even private part of the poet as an investigator and witness to nature and its secrets.

Each time I read one of her poems I feel as if she is inviting me into the woods with her to witness the natural world in all of its sacredness.

I have yet to read a poem of hers that disappointed me.

Her mood-infused poem "Rain" (the first poem in the book) is sublime; and "Mushrooms" is glorious!

Read "Mushrooms" slowly and listen to the language; see the imagery in the mind:

Rain, and then
the cool pursed
lips of the wind
draw them
out of the ground---
red and yellow skulls
pummeling upward
through leaves,
through grasses,
through sand; astonishing
in their suddenness,
their quietude,
their wetness, they appear
on fall mornings, some
balancing in the earth
on one hoof
packed with poison,
others billowing
chunkily, and delicious---
those who know
walk out to gather, choosing
the benign from flocks
of glitterers, sorcerors,
russulas,
panther caps,
shark-white death angels
in their torn veils
looking innocent as sugar
but full of paralysis:
to eat
is to stagger down
fast as mushrooms themselves
when they are done being perfect
and overnight
slide back under the shining
fields of rain.

My God! I don't think that even a mushroom would know itself in that way.

She is a sublime witness to the natural world.

Mary Oliver is one of my favorite poets -- and let me tell you, I don't have many "favorite poets".

I recommend this poetry collection to you!

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Beauty from Horror.
A Poet for all people!!!
Hughes is Pure
He, too, sang America
Dreams Deferred

Selected Poems of Langston Hughes
Langston Hughes
Manufacturer: Vintage
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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The Collected Poems of Langston Hughes
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Tender Buttons

ASIN: 067972818X
Release Date: 1990-09-12

Book Description

With the publication of his first book of poems, The Weary Blues, in 1926, Langston Hughes electrified readers and launched a renaissance in black writing in America. The poems Hughes wrote celebrated the experience of invisible men and women: of slaves who "rushed the boots of Washington"; of musicians on Lenox Avenue; of the poor and the lovesick; of losers in "the raffle of night." They conveyed that experience in a voice that blended the spoken with the sung, that turned poetic lines into the phrases of jazz and blues, and that ripped through the curtain separating high from popular culture. They spanned the range from the lyric to the polemic, ringing out "wonder and pain and terror-- and the marrow of the bone of life."

The poems in this collection were chosen by Hughes himself shortly before his death in 1967 and represent work from his entire career, including "The Negro Speaks of Rivers," "The Weary Blues," "Still Here," "Song for a Dark Girl," "Montage of a Dream Deferred," and "Refugee in America." It gives us a poet of extraordinary range, directness, and stylistic virtuosity.

Customer Reviews:

Beauty from Horror........2007-06-30

Langston Hughes' poems makes my knees knock. There is a little thrill with each poem, like I'm landing in a vat of buttermilk, and splashing happily about. With the subject matters he dares tackle one would think it'd be more realistic to walk away from a deluge of his work in deep depression.

Not so.

Instead I walked away with a dreamy smile and knocking knees. His ability to cull the beauty from the horror is...is...is

I'm wordless.

A Poet for all people!!!.......2005-11-23

The SELECTED POEMS of LANGSTON HUGHE by Langston Hughes is exactly what is implied by the title. Absent from these "selected poems" are the more radical and controversial poems written by Hughes in the 1930s. After Hughes was forced to testify before the anti-Communist committee to defend himself, he shied away from the radicalism that so entranced him and other Afro Americans who saw socialism as an better alternative to Jim Crow.

In this selection of his poetry, there is no chronological order to the poems. Rather, they are divided into sections representing a specific theme. Here, Hughes was trying (?) to imitate Walt Whitman in arrangement. "Afro-American Fragments," "Feet of Jesus," "Shadow of the Blues," "Sea and Land," absent is the poem written for the Jamaican sailor Ferdinand Smith, SAILOR ASHORE, "Distance Nowhere," "After Hours," "Life is Fine," "Lament over Love," "Magnolia Flowers," "Name in Uphill Letter," "Madam to You," "Montage of a Dream Deferred," and "Words Like Freedom."

The last section of poems reveal Hughes as a patriot which he actually was in life. Hughes believed in idea of the real USA and what the nation could be without prejudice. The poems I,TOO, DEMOCRACY, AFRICA, CONSIDER ME, REFUGEE IN AMERICA, FREEDOM TRAIN, THE NEGRO MOTHER and so on in this section are indicative of a patriotism despite injustices.

For those interested in a more comprehensive ouvre of Hughes poetry, I strongly recommend the COLLECTED POETRY OF LANGSTON HUGHES edited by Arnold Rampersad and associate editor David Roessel. It contains the most up to date work by Hughes and "all" his "known and published" poems. I purposely emphasized "known and published" because according to some academics there is said to exist unpublished poems of Hughes written to a black male lover that has yet to surface.

Langston Hughes is the poet of black America. His work captures the aspirations, hope, joy, tragedy, anger, and pride of many blacks past and present. But, he is also a poet for the working class man, black and of any race. There is a reason his poems have been translated into many languages and continue to inspire. The other reviews here capture some the essential essence of Hughes spirit.

Hughes is Pure.......2003-03-19

I had read several Hughes poems before buying this book, but I will admit that I had no grasp on the extent of his talent. These vivid poems were chosen by Hughes personally before his death in 1967.

They do so well to paint a picture of the time he lived -- of the blues, of love, of passion, of choices. He writes about faith and protest in a way that will move you.

I have read all of the poems exactly as they are placed in the book several times. I think I keep going back to them because this is poetry free of pretense -- it is grounded in reality and in sorrow.

Independent of age, of your ethnicity, and of your literary grasp, you will enjoy these poems. Simple and superb -- read them out loud.

He, too, sang America.......2001-10-15

"Selected Poems of Langston Hughes" is a rich selection from several decades of this poet's work. Hughes (1902-1967) is a poet of many moods and voices. His work is at times mournful, humorous, sensuous, or ironic. Many poems capture the rhythms of African-American vernacular speech. A number of narrative poems tell stories of Black life, and a number of his best poems feature female speakers. He also writes poems of social protest that deal with the anti-Black violence that has plagued the United States for so much of its history.

The poems in this book are divided into several sections. One of my favorite such sections, "Feet of Jesus," contains poems which evoke the prayers, preaching, and religious songs of African-American churches. "Madam to You" contains a number of poems in which Alberta K. Johnson tells her story. A strong-willed entrepreneur who often challenges authority figures, "Madam" is one of the most delightful characters in African-American literature.

The other sections of the book contain many of Hughes' most memorable poems: the sensuous "Midnight Dancer" ("Lips / Sweet as purple dew"), "Mother to Son" ("Life for me ain't been no crystal stair"), "Theme for English B" ("I am the only colored student in my class"), and "I, Too" ("I, too, sing America. / I am the darker brother").

The lines I quoted from "I, Too" may call to mind Walt Whitman's great American poem "Leaves of Grass." Indeed, I consider Hughes to be one of the great 20th century poetic heirs of Whitman, and "Selected Poems" is a magnificent testament to Hughes' passion and vision.

Dreams Deferred.......2001-07-16

Langston Hughes wrote poetry of exquisite pain and beauty throughout his life. His poetry can be sparse and rhythmic. It evinces visions of cities, the south, churches and deep muddy rivers.

Hughes touches on every subject important to life in 20th century America: family, friends, race, religion,love, music, prejudice and poverty. Each poem sparingly provides an image in words. Together these poems represent the great work of a true artist of the American Poetry.

One of his most popular and poignant poems is Harlem. It contains such beauty in his phrase - "a dream deferred" and such power in his words or does it explode?

I recommend this highly to anyone interested in modern poets and poetry.

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My New Favorite POET
This is essential poetry.
This poet touches me where I didn't know I lived.
Mueller Required Reading
Extraordinary

Alive Together: New and Selected Poems
Lisel Mueller
Manufacturer: Louisiana State University Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0807121282

Customer Reviews:

My New Favorite POET.......2007-03-08

This book of poetry won the Pulitzer Prize. That isn't the reason you should buy it, though. I can't think of another poet to compare her to.
She writes about a variety of topics, which makes her writing so easily accessible depending on whatever mood you're in or what you want to read.

Her poetry about birds is particularly detailed and lovely. As is the poetry about her mother, about death, abuse, about relationships...I can't imagine you'd be disappointed. Support POETS, support your own imagination and dreams - buy this book -- add this to your collection or give it as a gift. The title poem, Alive Together, is superb. Some other favorites: The Blind Leading the Blind, Why I need the Birds, When I am Asked, Things, Mirrors,
Missing the Dead, and JOY.

This is essential poetry........2006-07-31

I treasure this book. It is beautiful, clear, and profound. Mueller's words and perspective awaken me with each reading. Robyn Johnson

This poet touches me where I didn't know I lived........2002-08-26

I am amazed by her power. In her hands, words spring to life and life springs to words. Her mind plants the living experience in a kiss on the hand and flings it to her audience like affectionate royalty waving to an attentive crowd.

She was born in Hamburg, Germany and the "Curriculum Vitae" poem in this volume beautifully articulates her immigration to the United States and her life here. Mueller was recently awarded one of the largest prizes in literature, the 2002 Ruth Lilly Prize -- $100,000.00. Her poetry is worth that, and more.

Her Mother's death "hurt" her into poetry, she writes here, and yet the observations she gives through these poems are pure redemption. What she experiences is what we all know, and she offers it to us with reverence and respect in sparkling language of pure gold.

When she stumbles on the fact of aging: "One day," she writes, "on a crowded elevator, everyone's face was younger than mine. . . .The brilliant days and nights are breathless in their hurry."

I love everything she's written and eagerly wait for more.
One short poem just to treat you to an example of what poetry can be:

"EX MACHINA
"My word processor does not know Shakespeare.
It balks at ripeness, stops me at Othello
and Desdemona. They are not
in its vocabulary. On the other hand
it does not question arrogance and power,
accepts betrayal, jealousy and grief,
uncomprehending. They are on the list.

"I am reminded of the face
of the young killer on the screen
the other night. He knew the words
gun and crime and prison.
He even knew the word guilty,
but when he said it, his eyes were blank."

Buy this book -- and all her books if you can find them. Keep them nearby so you can reach into a poem when you need to be reminded what living is for.

Mueller Required Reading.......1999-12-08

Lisel Mueller is hands down one of the contemporary masters of the free verse form. In her second language she writes of exile, reclamation, home, beauty. She excels at the persona poem, writing devastating sequences on (among others) Hellen Keller, Patty Hearst, Monet, Schumann, Bach, Brendel, and Mary Shelly. This New and Selected will lead your straight to Mueller's individual collections, worth every penny.

Extraordinary.......1999-07-04

If you are looking for one poem about relationships, "Alive Together" is the one. And with the rest of the poems in this amazing collection you'll find more truth, beauty and life. Get this book. Read this book. Send "Alive Together" to your significant other.

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Polite, safe and boring
Beneath the Ice
Andrew has taken time to read, follow suit...

Selected Poems 1976-1997 (Faber Poetry)
Andrew Motion
Manufacturer: Faber & Faber
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0571195040

Customer Reviews:

Polite, safe and boring.......2003-07-08

The impression I get from reading this poetry is that underneath all of the poetic techniques and references to other poets there is very little. It is too safe, mediocre and polite. It is full of things like 'invisible and silent but the deep/ Foundation of ourselves, our cornerstone'. This attempt at quiet profundity doesn't work for me.

Nothing is transformed in this poetry. The world would be the same place without it.

His poem for the British victims of 9/11 was 3 stanzas and one sentence of musing on death, competently written and with poetic techniques used, but of no probity regarding the event.

Likewise his poem against the war, the point of which seemed to be the 'irony' that the region is a place historically associated with civilisation and now is the site of a war. So what? That kind of comment can be found in any newspaper column.

Beneath the Ice.......2003-02-11

The convincing emotion in this selection of poems is grief and Motion's unending quarrel with his mother's early death is the pulse of his career. The opening poem wanders in a present life but closes inexorably in the past, with his father's hand pushing back hair from a hospital bed-ridden mother's "desperate face" and "the way love looks, its harrowing clarity."

It is not clear what did for her, "A Blow to the Head" one long mid-career sequence calls it, but the emotional shut-down of the mother, her eyes that "refuse to recognise..and turn away", leave a residue in all the things Motion considers and it is grief where he finds full throated voice.

There are syntactical, grammatical infelicities in the earlier poems - "the more I think back to your house/I grew up in" - which jarrs and the poems have been revised for this volume and such blips are absent from later poems so I wonder why these are still here. But grief, even in the guise of another person's feelings, another person's excuses for grief, spills most strongly from the poems, even if it's grief for an animal which suddenly arises, compassion disguised as a social comedy in the late poem "The Spoilt Child" and its abandoned, wounded dog. And it is grief which Motion becomes more articulate, more debonaire in handling over the course of these books, grief, which is the cost of things.

Dramatic monologues and historical pastiches are a strong suit - these miniature novels often cram the sketch of a whole life consummately into a page or five. But the theme's the same: in "Independence" the long saga of a career and courtship in the Punjab and its aftermath only becomes more than history book clippings when the character loses and mourns his wife:
"collapsing dresses into tea chests,/scooping up the baby things, /your belts, a thrown-down petticoat... So much of you to find!" Which story ends with the Motion speaker's usual emotional pitch when not spurred into mournful song: "Sun is no more/than a white, widening slit. The sea/ a blank horizon returning to grey."

There is great temptation with the biographer of Larkin, let alone another Laureate-in-waiting, to compare his work with that master's - but only here and there does he strike a Larkinesque attitude - very successfuly. The poem "Hull" acknowledges Larkin before the speaker, at the end of the affair, looks out of the flat of his soon to be abandoned lover at the plant house below where strangers "nod to each other through floppy-tongued leaves" and a minah bird will say nothing "except- if you scare him badly enough - his name." The little humour piece "It is an Offence" discusses the defecation of the neighbour's whippet ("surprisingly slow for a whippet") with similarly Larkinesque clipped moans.

But it is the two animal stories I like best - "The Dancing Hippo" where Motion ably ventriloquises a circus manager and the trainer of a hippo who after learning to dance ("that we thought nothing/but seemed to them a miracle") is burnt to death. In his grief the trainer burst into the manager's van: "I know it was useless, of course, her dancing./I know. But God above it was beautiful!/Beautiful! God! - or something like that." Motion here is a master of the foreign voice, the colourful detail and does not show an inch too much of the borrowed gaberdine.

And then there is "Reading the Elephant" where another mourning spouse of sorts is "turning time back on itself" on Safari in Africa where he tries to get back to the beginning of things: "They never last long, these moments. With half a chance/We drop back to life as it is. I understand that./I'm not quite a fool. So to keep myself airborne I always/snapped open some book (some parachute) just as my trance/was ending..." then he gets stared out by an elephant coming upon him suddenly, to leave him "with everything clear." And so Motion actually is, a mind ready to fall back into distances and literary fugues unless it is jerked to by that death or other dangers which always recall that death, still holding him fast "standing on a frozen pond/entranced by someone else below the ice" ("Dead March"), and it is only the death of a friend, Ruth Haddon, and her elegy "Fresh Water" which can end in some second hand peace as he imagines her drowned form leaving the sunk ship, The Marchioness, "swimming back upstream, her red velvet party dress/flickering round her heels as she twists through the locks" back to the source of the Thames, the "wet mouth of the earth" where she vanishes, his mother.

Andrew has taken time to read, follow suit..........1999-08-01

A review of a book is a a singular piece of advice from a 'point of view' of the reader, to another reader? Andrew's selection of Keats' work is a well worthy read for any 'newcomer' or, for that matter, anyone interested in poetry and prose.

Stranger Music: Selected Poems and Songs

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Vintage Cohen
Happy Birthday to Me....
Fantastic Collection & Perfect 1st Cohen Book to Buy
songs and poems
One Of A Kind Artist

Stranger Music: Selected Poems and Songs
Leonard Cohen
Manufacturer: Vintage
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0679755411
Release Date: 1994-11-01

Book Description

For the first time in paperback--the selected work of the legendary singer, poet, and performer. Stranger Music presents a magnificent cross-section of Cohen's work--including 11 previously unpublished poems--and demonstrates definitively that Cohen is a writer of dazzling intelligence and a force that transcends genres.

Customer Reviews:

Vintage Cohen.......2007-01-27

More than once I've read poetry by favorite musicians and though, "Oh. Without music, this isn't very good." But Cohen was a writer first--the strength of his songs has always been the lyrics. This book is a collection of both poetry and lyrics (and a little poetic prose). It's vintage Cohen--dark and passionate and violent and melodramatic. It's about torrid love affairs and failed marriages and betrayal and war. If you like Cohen's lyrics, you'll like these poems, though you won't find any departures here.

Happy Birthday to Me...........2005-06-29

I had been introduced to Leonard Cohen in the late '80's through a high school boyfriend, and my roommate in college used to read his poetry when we had gatherings - when she read "Suzanne" aloud I realized for the first time how beautiful the lyrics were and, despite loving Cohen's music, I wanted to see more of his lyrics stripped bare so I could enjoy them on their own. I was in Austin on my birthday in th early 90's and was window-shopping the Tower Records on Guadelupe. Lo and behold, "Stanger Music" was on display. I remember it being expensive ( I was in college, $20.00 was a lot of money!) but heck, it was my birthday so I splurged. It's still one of my favorite gifts to myself and my all-time favorite book of poetry.
Cohen's writing reveals a lot of tenderness and soul while being very masculine. He writes about mundane things and makes them beautiful with his words, he observes everything with appreciation and is able to fully immerse himself in a moment - probably a quality honed during his monastic years. His poetry is very honest and unashamed, there is no fear of vulnerability. Some of it is deeply romantic and some is just downright sexy (but always tastefully so.) "My Room" is the most provocative two lines of poetry I've ever read. Truly amazing stuff, highly recommended.

Fantastic Collection & Perfect 1st Cohen Book to Buy.......2004-08-25

-
One of my top gift items: Turn people on to this book. It is a terrific, full anthology that includes much out-of-print material. The poetry is stylistically wide in scope (from how-did-he-do that perfect to sparse, intense, free-verse); it has unique, emotionally-driven language choices, rhythm and content. Its tenor is lugubrious, and its subject matter tends toward sex and religion.

This, as opposed to his individual books of poetry: The individual books are typically short and some are wonderful -- each is very different, thus liked by different tastes. If you don't own any Cohen books, buy this first -- it's got great poems (plus clips of prose, as from "Beautiful Losers"). The chapters are laid out by book and album title (lyrics are here, too); therefore, if/when you want another book after, you will know which one. One thing I don't like about it is the change in poem titles from their originals.

This books ends when Cohen is in his 50's, at least in the previously unpublished poems at the end -- so, before the monastery part of his life, though religion is well part of him (he is Orthodox Jewish and views his Buddhism as compatible with his Judaism). I'm not much a fan of his post-monastery work, and if I have one regret it's that I discovered Leonard Cohen within the past ten years, and never got to see him live.

Know, too, that Cohen was a published poet--well-known in Canada--before he recorded music. He began to play guitar while reading poetry -- it went over well!

songs and poems.......2004-03-19

Some people who listen to Leonard Cohen's music hardly realize that he was (or is) well-known as a poet for a very long time. There was a real tradition of songwriters who were poets, especially starting back in the '50s and '60s, like Bob Dylan, Allen Ginsberg, Jim Morrison, etc. I think Cohen's classic work however is "Beautiful Losers", especially excerpts like "All Right, Edith" and "Believe Me, Edith". It's in here. As well as lotsa poems and the lyrics to some of his songs that pass for poetry.

David Rehak
author of "Poems From My Bleeding heart"

One Of A Kind Artist.......2003-12-03

I would not be the writer that I am today if I hadn't discovered the works of Leonard Cohen when I was a 16 yr old kid.

Leonard Cohen's poetry is beatiful and scary and sensual. No one writes like him; he is truly one of a kind.

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The poet Borges less
This book is a treasure.
Worth the time, very translatable poet
Borges shines, translations are uneven
Translated?

Borges: Selected Poems
Jorge Luis Borges
Manufacturer: Penguin (Non-Classics)
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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Borges: Selected Non-Fictions
Borges: Collected Fictions
This Craft of Verse (The Charles Eliot Norton Lectures)
Labyrinths: Selected Stories & Other Writings (New Directions Paperbook)
Ficciones (English Translation)

ASIN: 0140587217
Release Date: 2000-04-03

Amazon.com

During his life, Jorge Luis Borges wore many hats. He was, variously, a poet, an essayist, a short-story writer, a librarian, and, for a short time, a poultry inspector. Born in Argentina in 1899, he lived for several years in Europe before eventually returning home to Buenos Aires in the early 1920s. It was here that Borges started his career as a writer. At the age of 24, he published his first volume of poetry, and though he would go on to garner considerable acclaim as an essayist and crafter of fiction, he always considered himself first and foremost a poet. This bilingual edition of Selected Poems, edited by Alexander Coleman, gathers together 200 poems from different periods of Borges's life, including some that will be appearing in English for the first time.

Whether he was writing fiction, essays, or poetry, there were certain themes and subjects that Borges returned to time and again. His home town became a favorite topic--in his first collection, Fervor de Buenos Aires, he wrote: "My soul is in the streets / of Buenos Aires," a sentiment that remained constant throughout his life. This collection reveals other preoccupations as well--with history in all its permutations, Borges's own ancestry, and his fascination with metaphysics, mazes, mirror images, and the blurry line between parallel realities:

The celibate white cat surveys himself
in the mirror's clear-eyed glass,
not suspecting that the whiteness facing him
and those gold eyes that he's not seen before
in ramblings through the house are his own likeness.
Who is to tell him the cat observing him
is only the mirror's way of dreaming?

This companion volume to Andrew Hurley's new translation of Collected Fictions boasts a stellar cast of translators, including W.S. Merwin, Mark Strand, and John Updike among others. Admirers of Borges will find Selected Poems a fitting memorial to the great man; and for those have never had the pleasure of reading him before, this book is a wonderful introduction. --Alix Wilber

Book Description

An unparalleled and long-overdue volume of poetry by "the most important Spanish writer since Cervantes"(Mario Vargas Llosa).

Though universally acclaimed for his dazzling fictions, Jorge Luis Borges always considered himself first and foremost a poet. This new bilingual selection brings together some two hundred poems--the largest collection of Borges' poetry ever assembled in English, including scores of poems never previously translated. Edited by Alexander Coleman, the selection draws from a lifetime's work--from Borges' first published volume of verse, Fervor de Buenos Aires (1923), to his final work, Los conjurados, published just a year before his death in 1986. Throughout this unique collection the brilliance of the Spanish originals is matched by luminous English versions by a remarkable cast of translators, including Robert Fitzgerald, Stephen Kessler, W. S. Merwin, Alastair Reid, Mark Strand, Charles Tomlinson, and John Updike.

"A surfeit of riches. . . . Jorge Luis Borges' poetry alone would be enough to underwrite his immense reputation."-- San Francisco Chronicle

Exquisitely packaged edition with French flaps and rough front, quality paper stock.

Customer Reviews:

The poet Borges less.......2004-12-13

This review is about a single question. Why if Borges considered himself a poet above all, and if this book contains as it does contain most of his major themes are his real readers and his real fame the readers of his stories essays and short prose-pieces ? Why is the most loved Borges not found in the poems when the poems too do at times like the stories tell stories?
Perhaps it is because the language of poetry is more dense and ambigious and breaks the flow of the story. Perhaps it is because on the nonetheless more extended palette of the story a more extensive picture can be painted. Perhaps it is because too the element of mystery so great in Borges work comes to us in a stronger way in a narrative telling? Or perhaps too Borges whether he likes it or not is in his lists and his recollections really more a figure of prose than of poetry. And perhaps and this the real paradox Borges poetry is too more prose- like than poetic in many ways. Perhaps his way of going on in such intellectual questioning fashion renders his poetry more mind- like and less in deep lyric feeling than the deepest poetry means?
I ask this as prelude to saying a few words about these poems most of which I have read, and few of which I remember.And this too is part of it. The Borges name is connected with those tales from The Aleph to Funes to Borges and I . It is less connected with any of the poems
And all of this review seems now to me somehow unfair. Borges is a great writer and his words mean more than anything written about them. Reading these poems will give so much pleasure , so much material for reflection, so many characters, stories, moods, ideas, dreams, passages of life, labyrinths, ships, coffee cups, imitations, duels in the sun and duels in the darkness, light as a metaphor and light as light, darkness as darkness and darkness as sight, worlds within and more worlds within and more worlds within and without and words as literature true literature literature of the tradition that the maker Borges makes and remakes and makes and remakes a poem.

This book is a treasure. .......2004-11-02

It is strange reviewing it. It's like reviewing some sacred book...
The whole World is here. And more... Here is Argentina with its familiar (to Borges) streets; here is a poem about chess, the Moon, tigers. Men. Here is Iceland in all its beauty and past; in a way no one else can ever portray it. Beautiful poems about art, God, history, mirrors, death, life, war, Shinto, Love, time, eternity, blindness, mortality, emotion, thoughts... everything and nothing...
Through this precious book we may perceive all of this through Borges' blind, ever watching, tired eyes.
I love to be lost in all those words...

Worth the time, very translatable poet.......2004-05-13

Borges possesses a very universal mind, as anyone who has read him knows. For this reason his poetry is also relatively translatable. It contains almost every important poem, with conjectures being his most famous. The translation provided is fairly good, although there are several instances of misjudgement, or that is my opinion anyway. For instance, one work title ¨El enemigo generoso¨ (the generous enemy) is translated into english as ¨The generous friend¨. While I certainly can appreciate the irony of this translation and its potential irony, i think borges, as an incredible mind, should be left to decide these matters for himself. Unless the cover first lists the translators'names. Nonetheless Borges'poetry is overshadowed by his shortstories (Ficciones and El Aleph), and I recommend all to read this book. Great diversity, and a very original mind

Borges shines, translations are uneven.......2004-02-16

Borges was fascinated by English. As a kid, he grew up speaking it with his English grandmother and he spent the rest of his life ransacking the treasure-chest of English and American literature. In a famous prose-poem published in 1960, "Borges and I", he could cite Robert Louis Stevenson's prose as one his favorite things (alongside the taste of coffee and the strumming of a guitar). And even after he lost his eyesight in mid-age, most of the books he went on reading in his mind were in English.

Consequently, he sounds good in translation. It's tough to make Neruda or Lorca or even a lot of novelists writing in Spanish sound clear and convincing in English. Lorca, for example, wrote in a distinctively Andalusian idiom, and nobody who has never read his poetry in the original can understand how stilted he sounds in English. Borges, by contrast, had a more universal intellect and the strands of his writing span many non-Hispanic cultures. His reading in many different literatures left a deep imprint on him linguistically and helps explain why his work translates so well into other languages. While it's true that much of his poetry has a distinctly Argentine "flavor", it has many other flavors, as well. Depending on the poem, Borges can evoke Quevedo, Leopoldo Lugones, "Beowulf", the Icelandic Prose Edda, Whitman, Omar Khayyam, or Ralph Waldo Emerson. And yet the English influence is present in virtually all of his work.

Thirteen translators are featured in this anthology and the quality varies. Barnstone and Merwin are, as usual, impeccably accurate and 1000% unadventurous. Robert Fitzgerald shows yet again that his last name must be some kind of cosmic byword for quality (F. Scott, Edward, Ella, now Robert...). His version of "Odyssey, Book Twenty-Three" is breathtakingly tight and sweeping, actually more of a rendition than a word-for-word translation. Unlike Barnstone's somewhat stilted versions of Borges' sonnets, Fitzgerald manages to stick to the original rhyme-scheme without sounding forced. Unfortunately, he only did five poems in this book. ¡Qué lastima!

Alistair Reid did most of the work here. Reid is a perfect example of a fine translator who did some really great stuff back in the '60s, then apparently revised it to make stuffy literalists like Barnstone happy. For example, he took an excellent translation of "Limits" (which appeared in a 1967 book called "A Personal Anthology", which basically launched Borges's reputation in the United States) and altered it to make the words stick more closely to the original Spanish word order. It's still a good translation and all, but not as good as the first one. Other than that, though, I don't have any bones to pick with Reid.

Translated?.......2001-06-07

Although in the beginning I ignored the Spanish, the English should serve as little more than a crutch for those who study Spanish. Heck, I'm a lowly second-year student and as I'm plugging away at the book, I'm amazed at how great the translations are on their own -- and how little they show Borges' style to an English audience. The poems are great in either language -- but if you have a knowledge of Spanish, you'd be best off buying a completely Spanish volume if you could find it for less.

The Stream & the Sapphire: Selected Poems on Religious Themes (New Directions Paperbook, 844)

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Levertov profoundly interacts with Christian relgious themes
Nature in religion
"Straight to the point can ricochet"

The Stream & the Sapphire: Selected Poems on Religious Themes (New Directions Paperbook, 844)
Denise Levertov
Manufacturer: New Directions Publishing Corporation
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Binding: Paperback

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This Great Unknowing
Poetry As Prayer: Denise Levertov (The Poetry As Prayer Series)
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ASIN: 0811213544

Customer Reviews:

Levertov profoundly interacts with Christian relgious themes.......2005-01-30

This collection of "selected poems on religious themes" is not to be confused with religious poetry, or inspirational poetry. Here we have a renowned modern poet from the late 20th Century, who embraced the Christian faith late in life, interacting with spiritual sources that crossed her path while on her journey of faith.

Often one only gets out of a poem what one brings to it, at other times the poem speaks for itself. Both are the case here. Levertov develops a personal dialogue with various texts, personages and paintings, such as Thomas Merton, Julian of Norwich, the Mass for St. Thomas Didymus, Caedmon from Bede's "History of the English Church," Velazquez's "The Servant Girl at Emmaus," Brother Lawrence's "Practice of the Presence of God," "Hail, space for the uncontained God" (from the Orthodox Christian Akathist hymn), as well as numerous New Testament passages.

Some of these poems presuppose at least a nodding acquaintance with the original source. Others, such as those dealing with Christ's suffering on the cross, will be more accessible, since most of our culture still retains an awareness of the life of Christ.

While I struggled through some of these works, knowing that if I took the time I could get much more out of them, others demanded to be read a second and third time immediately.

Such was the case with "Annunciation," which draws on the Gospel account of when the angel Gabriel announces to Mary that she is to bear the Son of God: "But we are told of meek obedience. No one mentions/ courage./ The engendering Spirit/did not enter her without consent./ God waited./ She was free/ to accept or to refuse, choice/ integral to humanness."

Many still believe that modern poetry and the Christian faith don't mix. Here is proof otherwise. Going through this volume may be like mining for gold for some, but believe me, it's worth the effort. If you like this volume, check out works by Scott Cairns, also found here at Amazon.

Nature in religion.......1999-01-14

The need for simple groupings of poems into thematic clusters may be too convenient and decpetive of the complexities of the poems themselves. But with Levertov, as with others, there is such a compelling predeliction towards specific themes and subjects that to do so can be useful.Here we have her major religious poems in a separate volume, just as there has been a volume of her poems on nature and a deserved volume of her political poems (if one hasn't been published already). These poems do chart Levertov's progressive understanding and acceptance of Christianity, but at their best they do something else. Their focus is often on natural scenes which have a humbling effect. The level sought isn't always that of the often over-mystified religious ceremony, though there's plenty of mystery to the poems. In "The Avowel" this effect is achieved through analogy, the submissive posture of lying on one's back hearkening not only a religious submission but one which the speaker is reminded of by the natural world. "As swimmers dare/ to lie face to the sky/ and water bears them,/ as hawks rest upon air/ and air sustains them,/ so would I learn to attain/ freefall, and float/ into Creator Spirit's deep embrace,/ knowing no effort earns/ that all-surrounding grace."

The "free-falling" that occurs is much like that effect of flight in George Herbert's concrete poem "Easter Wings," which takes the shape of a bird. Here the use of a center alignment (which is hard for me to approximate) gives the impression of both the "deep embrace" and the fall, each line arrising not from a speakerly margin but from a need more like song. Again, the groupings of these poems together is a faulty judgement of Levertov's range, yet considering her uncanny ability to mask her concerns in a seemingly banal tone through everyday language we should be thankful that these small volumes have been available as studies into one of the best American poets of the last half century.

"Straight to the point can ricochet".......1997-04-27

This set of books frighten me. Both are powerful and wonderful and deserve your immediate and lasting attention. The poems are not new, they are a themed selection. Interestingly enough placed in seperate but equal volumes.

The Stream and the Sapphire is a selection of poems that elucidate the growth of Denise as a Christian. And an exciting growth it is. My favorite of the moment are words I use as prayer: "How can I focus my flickering, perceive at the fountain's heart the sapphire I know is there?"

The Life Around Us is subtitled "selected poems on nature". In "A Reward", we live a harried day with the narrator and watch with her as "the heron, unseen for weeks, came flying widewinged toward me."

What is probably a marketing tool, a most wise one by the publisher, is what scares me about these two volumes. In theme, the power of God is told in lush detail in both volumes. The heron in the nature selection is the holy spirit of the religious selection, and in our natural state both can and will be the same. Those brief moments of recognition of something outside ourselves.

So with these two volumes to recommend, why should I be trepiditious? The marketing folks know us so well, and as poets we cannot overcome the marketing department. "Christians" are right winged slobs that grow fat and salute the flag and make fools of themselves on TV. They have absolutely no regard for nature because they are Republicans bound and determined to destroy the rainforest. Friends of the natural world cannot be interested in true spiritual life because they worship nature, and are Democrats, and would not consider a Christian a person. A nature person is good and upright and has never done wrong, and therefore has no need of the "crutch" of Christianity.

Crass? Yep. That's why I'm scared of these two books. Because it brings out the crass nature of our commercialized economy. Everything is cut and dry - a cookie cutter product determined and produced by a media that thrives on exacting stereotypes. I can hear the salesman now walking into the Christian bookstore pitching the blue book; and the same salesman waking into the New Age bookstore pitching the green book. I'm saddened and scared that it's come to this - even in poetry. It's been with us in every other aspect of life for so many years now that I guess it had to be inevitable.

Truth is, most Christians live in a more calm life than the wild-eyed frothing at the mouth pentacostal, or the bomb-throwing fanatic at an abortion clinic. It may be surprising to those who only read newspapers and watch tv to find out that many Christians believe God commanded them to take care of the planet. And vice-versa. Not all nature lovers worship the earth as God. Not all folks who are concerned with the environment are anti-Christian. Surprisingly to the media-fed public is the fact that there are many people who love the outdoors who feel abortion is just as wrong as shooting a bald eagle or a snowy songed owl.

Not all republicans are anti-abortion; not all democrats are pro-abortion; and not all those who could care less about politics have no opinion either way. There are many varieties of individuals; and within most of us, I believe strongly, there is a wonderful mixture of all the above. Let's face it, when confronted with a child molester who just raped his child, the strongest anti-abortion catholic would probably much rather kill the man as see him live, even if only for a brief moment. Why? Because we are human.

Which brings this around from a silly sermon back to the issue at hand - Denise Levertov celebrates our humanity. We see Thomas - in some circles known as the twin brother of Christ - struggling with his doubts. We hear in other places the voice of the poet struggling with questions and wandering doubts. In the nature series we hear the narrators of the poems finding a deep peace - if only momentary, a solace - a knowledge. Read together we find these powerful insights are all one insight into our inner selves.

And, slyly, in selecting the poems, Denise was able to confound the marketing department. From the nature series: "God is imaged as well or better in the white stillness resting everywhere, giving all things an hour of Sabbath." And from the religious series: "Dull stones again fulfill their glowing destinies, and emptiness is a cup, and holds the ocean." Why not combine these two selctions of poems into one fine volume? Marketing. Sad, but true. Recently, ND published Robert Duncan's selected - 170+ pages for $12.95. By seperating Denise's poems for a perceived dual market (and unfortunately the perception is probably true), the sales force is able to sell the two slender volumes for $8.95 apiece. A few extra bucks - and because of the targeted audience - a lot more sales!

My recommendation? Confound the marketing department. Buy both books! Praise both books. And praise Denise for giving us such interesting meditations on life. If you can, then read or re-read her past volumes and experience her growth in a more natural form; but if you are in a position of experiencing her poetry for the first time, these two small volumes will be an appetizer that will send you searching to experience the flavors of The Jacob's Ladder, Evenings In Babylon, Evening Train, and quite a few more

Messenger: New and Selected Poems 1976-2006

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Messenger: New and Selected Poems 1976-2006
Ellen Bryant Voigt
Manufacturer: W. W. Norton
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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The Collected Poems: 1956-1998
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Collected Poems

ASIN: 0393062503

Book Description

Startling new pieces join poems from the celebrated poet's previous collections.

This collection arranges poems from the author's six highly praised books alongside a group of astonishing new pieces.

"Her gift is the elegy, cool and direct as rain, but varied and intricate with masterful praise….Poems passionate but disciplined sing line by line."—2002 National Book Award finalist citation

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Poetry for the human experience
Bright Stars on a Winter Night
Captivating and Honest
The Struggle and Beauty of Living

Otherwise: New & Selected Poems
Jane Kenyon
Manufacturer: Graywolf Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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Without: Poems
The Best Day the Worst Day: Life with Jane Kenyon
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White Apples and the Taste of Stone: Selected Poems 1946-2006

ASIN: 1555972667

Amazon.com

This collection stands as something of a tribute to Jane Kenyon, who died in 1995 at the age of 48. Otherwise contains 20 new poems plus selected works from her four previous collections. The situations from which her lively writing arise often came from her daily life in and around the New Hampshire farm where she lived with her husband. The simple settings provides fertile ground for her richness of language. "As late as yesterday ice preoccupied the pond--dark, half-melted, waterlogged. Then it sank in the night, one piece, taking winter with it. And afterward everything seems simple and good." Beautiful, gracious poetry.

Book Description

Otherwise collects a lifetime's work by one of contemporary poetry's most cherished talents. Opening with twenty new poems and including generous selections from Jane Kenyon's four previous books—From Room to Room, The Boat of Quiet Hours, Let Evening Come, and Constance—this collection was selected and arranged by Kenyon herself—alongside her husband, the esteemed poet Donald Hall—shortly before her death in April 1995.

This extensive gathering reveals a scrupulously crafted body of work in which poem after poem achieves a rare and somber grace. Light and shade are never far apart in these telling narratives of life and love and work at the poet's rural New Hampshire home. The shadow of depression in Kenyon's verse, which grew much darker and longer at certain intervals, has the force and heft of a spiritual presence—a god, demon, angel. Yet her work emphasizes the constant effort of her imagination to confront and even find redemption in suffering. However quiet or domesticated or subtle in her moods and methods, Kenyon was a poet who sought to discover the extraordinary within the ordinary, and her poems continue to make this discovery. As Hall writes in the afterword to Otherwise, we share "her joy in the body and the creation, in flowers, music, and paintings, in hayfields and a dog."

Customer Reviews:

Great product & service.......2006-03-01

Book was received promptly and in new, perfect condition!
Thank you again for the great service.

Poetry for the human experience.......2003-12-20

It was this anthology of poetry that transformed my mother from a woman who dislikes poetry to a woman who reads it every day. I read her one poem and got her hooked. Jane Kenyen speaks directly to her reader, using simple images and plain language, capturing experiences that often feel familiar and sometimes reminding us of their meaning and significance. This is not poetry that could be shouted at a poetry slam or puzzled over by scholars looking for allusions to Sanskrit texts. This is poetry about our lives, about burying the cat, ironing a tablecloth, saying goodbye to guests, winter weather, faith, sadness, and love. I love poetry, but sometimes it feels daunting and inaccessible. Jane Kenyon writes like I am her guest, sitting at her kitchen table, and she has a moment to share.

Bright Stars on a Winter Night.......2000-11-14

Jane Kenyon's OTHERWISE is perhaps the best collection of American poetry in the past decade. With her accessible and illuminating poems, Ms. Kenyon captures the essence of life in all its ordinariness and extraordinariness. "Let Evening Come," for example, is a nearly perfect gem -- thoughtful, concise, movingly eloquent. Throughout this collection, the poet demonstrates a remarkable clarity of vision; her diction and meter are gorgeous, her wit and insight profound yet never burdensome. Whether recalling a scene from her childhood, an hour in winter, a cancer treatment, a death in the family, or a walk with the dog, Ms. Kenyon inspires, illuminates, and entertains.

Captivating and Honest.......2000-03-10

I absolutely love this book. Jane Kenyon's poetry describes some of the most simple, daily activities in a way that brings out their hidden beauty and grace. You can sense the careful observation and truthfullness of what she describes, yet as you read you can interpret the symbolism behind certain passages and the realizations there aswell. I feel so deeply connected with this book. Her poetry speaks the words we cannot say. You won't regret buying this book.

The Struggle and Beauty of Living.......1998-08-12

Jane Kenyon's poems show a keen observation of everyday detail -- "the luminous particular," as her husband Donald Hall puts it -- with a muted level of emotion. A typical poem in this ample collection meanders through several fine images, then pulls them together at the end with a description of mood or a realization. Kenyon is especially fond of the smell of wet earth, the sound of rain, and images of water. In general, her images are much more successful than her similes. Some of her beautiful phrases are reminiscent of traditional Chinese poetry: "...the water...stares back at the moon from its cool terra-cotta urn"; of Sharon Olds: "Not dark enough, not the utter darkness he desired"; and of Anna Akhmatova, whom she translated from the Russian, cf. Kenyon's poem "The Appointment." In the poem "Trouble with Math..." an incident about undeserved punishment ends with, "She led me, blinking and changed, back to! the class." -- Changed in what way? The author's language is spare and delicate, but sometimes the point gets lost. The overall impression is that the author was straining toward happiness, and she made the most of the occasional window of opportunity allowed her by illness. I found the book pleasant to read, but when it was once closed, very little remained with me. This author does not have the same clarity and robustness as, say, Luise Gluck, another poet who suffered from depression. But I did find Jane Kenyon poignant and alive when she spoke directly about her experience of illness, e.g. when she says, "I'm falling upward, nothing to hold me down."

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Mary Oliver's Poetry
Be Ignited Or Be Gone
Mary Oliver is magical
Too much of a good thing....
She Explores The Natural World In Beautiful Words!

New and Selected Poems: Volume Two
Mary Oliver
Manufacturer: Beacon Press
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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New and Selected Poems: Volume One
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ASIN: 0807068861

Amazon.com

As Diane Wakoski has noted, the power of Mary Oliver's Frost-influenced pastoral writing is in her ability to cast a spell, to create "the illusion that the natural world is graspable." Oliver's fierce independence, beautiful imagery, and love and knowledge of the natural world are all driven by a searching mind, expressed in poems that make for good company. In Some Questions You Might Ask, Oliver gives us this one to chew over: "Is the soul solid, like iron?/ or is it tender and breakable, like/ the wings of a moth in the beak of an owl?" Highly recommended.

Book Description

Mary Oliver has been writing poetry for nearly five decades, and in that time she has become America's foremost poetic voice on our experience of the physical world. This collection presents thirty-two new poems-an entire volume in itself-along with works chosen by Oliver from six of the books she has published since New and Selected Poems, Volume One. This graceful volume, designed to be paired with New and Selected Poems, Volume One, includes new poems on birds, toads, flowers, insects, bodies of water, and the extraordinary experience of the everyday in our lives. In the words of Alicia Ostriker, "Mary Oliver moves by instinct, faith, and determination. She is among our finest poets, and still growing." In both the older and new poems, Mary Oliver is a poet at the height of her control of image and language. "Oliver's often quiet persona almost always rides a storm of discovery . . . She continues to earn applause and admiration for continuing to provide redemptive mediation and supple praises for nature in a time when so much is under threat." -R. T. Smith, Shenandoah

Customer Reviews:

Mary Oliver's Poetry.......2007-05-12

This is a collection of her poems, old and new. She is an outstanding poet, and one cannot do better than have her book of poems by your bedside, to read before going to sleep or when you awake in the night, or first thing in the morning.

Be Ignited Or Be Gone.......2007-04-10

The Pulitzer Prize winning poet, Mary Oliver, finishes her poem,"What Have I Learned So Far" with the line, 'Be ignited, or be gone.'To me, this conveys the passion she brings to life and poetry. What comes through clearly in her poems is her reverence for nature.
New and Selected Poems, Volume Two, is a moving collection of her past works combined with many new poems. There is a Zen isness that permeates her work.Haiku like parsimony with no embellishment. Nature does not need anything extra. For example, writing about what she saw after a storm -
And this detail: the body of a duck, a golden-eye; and beside
it one black-backed gull. In the body of the duck, among the breast
feathers, a hole perhaps an inch across; the color within the hole
a shouting red. And bend it as you might, nothing was to blame:
storms must toss, and the great black-backed gawker must eat, and
so on. It was merely a moment.
I recently saw Mary Oliver at the 92nd Street 'Y' in New York City where she was reading from this collection. See her if you can. She reads as she writes, with dignity and with passion and wisdom. This is an extraordinary collection of poems.

Mary Oliver is magical.......2007-02-17

I have about 5 of her poetry books. I feel that her poetry has gotten more and more beautiful over time, and believe that this collection is better than Volume 1. Mary Oliver is definitely my favorite poet - much of her writing is about a thirst for growth and spirituality, and finding peace in nature and love (friendships and relationships). I have given this book to a number of friends, who are also touched by her gift of expressing the unexpressable. Some of my favorite poems in this book: the Percy series (her dog), Why I Wake Early, and The Whistler.

My other favorite book of Mary Oliver poems is her most recent one: "Thirst". It deals with grief at the lost of her long-time partner and is quite beautiful. For those looking for a really good book of poems in general, I *definitely* recommend "Good Poems," compiled by Garrison Keillor; and "Risking Everything: 110 Poems of Love and Redemption" compiled by Roger Housden. Enjoy!

Too much of a good thing...........2007-01-09

I read Mary Oliver's new book with much anticipation but was disappointed. It is for me too much of the same throughout. The old poems she included are still the best. Where is the fire?

She Explores The Natural World In Beautiful Words!.......2005-12-16

Mary Oliver's poems are masterful creations that resonate in my mind and heart each time I read them. Her language is soulful; her imagery brillant. She is a master craftsman who builds each poem precisely.

Her poems talk of so many things in the natural world; she distills each to its barest essence and allows us the enjoyment of sharing it; I always feel as though she invites me to come along to discover these sacred sights and insights found in nature.

The poems in this collection explore and reveal the essence of fireflies, moss, the stars, the toad, the owl, Daisies, beans, the cricket, the Black Bear, the seasons, Blackwater (a place), the Soul and many other creatures and their habitats.

She is a sublime poet of the natural world and this collection is superb!

I recommend it to anyone!

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