Read Living Poets
A recent National Endowment for the Arts survey found only 7% of Americans read a work of poetry annually. Outside of outliers like instagrammable break-out poet Rupi Kaur, books of poetry rarely crack into the public conscious or the best-sellers list.
At the same time though, poetry is flourishing. The internet and progress in publishing technology have created innumerable online spaces and accessible physical means for more poets to share, read, and be read. Awareness movements like #teachlivingpoets have encouraged teachers to expand their curriculums beyond the classics and increase young readers’ exposure to contemporary writing.
This list of living and working poets highlights the variety of the medium, and the diversity of style, language and vision that make up the oft-over-simplified lump-sum of contemporary poetry.
Life on Mars : poems by Tracy K. Smith
U.S. Poet Laureate Tracy K. Smith won the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry for this book in 2012. Throughout, Smith employs a clever use of language in meditation upon personal loss in the context of the universe, and draws upon the life and passing of her father, a scientist who worked on the hubble telescope.
Motherland, fatherland, homelandsexuals by Patricia Lockwood
Lockwood rose to prominence on the cutting edge of Twitter and online poetry, tactfully navigating this new landscape with wit and a careful mix of high and low language. The skillfully brash humour, insight and poetic flair that built her online fanbase infuse this book, and give each piece a unique mark of Lockwood’s experience, personality and serious skills as a poet.
Blue laws : selected & uncollected poems, 1995-2015 by Kevin Young
Kevin Young recently became poetry editor for The New Yorker. This collection will make it clear why. His ability to successfully employ a wide array of styles and a rich and diverse sense of language, make him a banner poet for his generation. Deftly mixing a pop-culture saturated world with the emmince presence of history and the long arc of poetic tradition.
Devotions : the selected poems of Mary Oliver by Mary Oliver
As The Washington Post put it: “Oliver extols the beauty and complexity around her and reminds us of the interconnectedness of living.” It is that mindfulness that consistently draws readers to Oliver’s work. This collection of poems from throughout her career sees her focusing attention on a dynamic set of subjects, finding that “interconnectedness” in novel places and invoking it in strong memorable imagery.
Citizen : an American lyric by Claudia Rankine
Rankine’s genre defying book shot her into the mainstream after decades of writing and teaching. It’s exploration of race dynamics in America is daring, thoughtful and kaliedescopic, and Rankine’s command of her form and focus neatly tie together disparate topics. Her blur of poetry and essay-like nonfiction make this a particularly exciting piece of literature equal parts timeless and poignantly of-the-moment.
For Youth
Long way down by Jason Reynolds
Reynolds’s story, told in poetic verse, has been lavished with awards and honors since its publication in October, 2017. He makes good use of the form, composing individual pieces, concise and packed with depth, that act as intimate glimpses into the life and experiences of the narrator. This makes for a complex but approachable read, with ample use of formal techniques to evoke and enhance meaning.
The crossover by by Kwame Alexander
In a similar way Alexander employs verse and poetic style to tell a rich and engaging story in The Crossover. Alexander takes it further, employing more extravagant gestures, playing with fonts, and text layout to draw new possibilities for meaning out of the words. These dimensions add an exciting element that is both nuanced and dynamic.
Love & misadventure by Lang Leav
Love is a quintessential topic of poetry, for well known poets like William Shakespeare and Pablo Neruda, and in personal tributes of Valentine’s Day cards and wedding ceremonies. Leav captures the spirit of love in that tradition, with simple and direct language, building a relatable and inspiring journey over the course of one poem to another.
Anthologies
As the saying goes, you don’t know what you don’t know. The best way to get introduced to poetry and figure out what you like, is by reading a variety of different poets and poems. Here are just a few recent anthologies to get you started.
Pushcart prize XLII, 2018 : best of the small presses edited by Bill Henderson
The best American poetry. 2017 edited by Natasha Trethewey
The Breakbeat poets : new American poetry in the age of hip-hop edited by Kevin Coval
American hybrid : a Norton anthology of new poetry edited by Cole Swensen
Literary journals at The Library
Connect to the Library’s databases and you’ll discover a wealth of resources.
Here are just a few journals regularly publishing new poetry.
Find them in full-text online in our Academic Search Elite database.*
Ploughshares
Antioch
The New Yorker
American Poetry Review
Sewanee Review
Chicago Review
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