Tell Us About...Five Favorite American Poets

I am fortunate to have joined a talented group of bloggers for the Global Writing Challenge. Each month, we write about a very broadly defined topic, and the responses are quite varied. The newly revised group includes Deb’s World, Marsha in the Middle, Suzy Turner, Once Upon a Time and Happily Ever After Again, Cat's Wire, Coffee and Cocktails at the Casa, and me.

This month, Marsha selected the topic Poetry...and though I knew I wanted to discuss some of my favorite American poets and poems for this post, it was difficult to narrow the list to a manageable number, in part because I couldn't decide which of my favorites were my "most favorite" enough to make the cut and which to leave out.

So I decided that I would use a different criterion to select the poets: for which American poets do I own a book of their poetry?

There was a time that this would have still presented a challenge, but over the years, I have moved house so many times that my book collection has been quite winnowed down. (If you've packed up your own house in recent years, you will recall that books are large and heavy and take up a crazy number of boxes.) All sections of my book collection have been hit hard, and only a small handful of American poets are still represented. Interestingly, all my remaining poetry books date to high school.

Previously discussed: Edgar Allen Poe & "A Dream Within a Dream"

See my April "Dream/Nightmare" Tell Us About post under the section: 9 - Poems.

#1: E. E. Cummings

American students might remember E. E. Cummings from the poems "somwhere I have never traveled, gladly beyond" (this is the one I remember best from school) or "i carry your heart with me(i carry it in" (which is apparently his most famous poem). As you can gather from those awkward poem titles (which are the first line of the poem as he did not give the poems titles), he is known for his modernist free-form poetry and his eschewing of capital letters.

My book (a 1990 print of this collection) has taken some damage over the years.

Helpfully, at the back of the book I had a piece of paper on which I had listed the poem numbers of some of my favorite poems circa 1990.

Flipping through, this is one I remember fondly for the surreal phrase "Thingish with moondrool" and for his efforts to reassure his nervous lover with the characterization of the moon as a dog that is "faithful and mad."

Going through old books, it's fun to see what we have used as bookmarks over the years. This one had a zoo guide, which feels on brand for me.

#2: Edna St. Vincent Millay

Many Americans are familiar with her little poem First Fig, but I don't remember reading her in school. In contrast to E. E. Cummings, she was a lyrical poet who embraced traditional forms and subjects in her work.

My edition of this collection is also from 1990. I had marked several poems with paper clips for easy reference, which made it straightforward to identify the ones I have returned to the most.

I have a special love of very short but powerful poems. Realistically, this is probably my favorite of all her work.

This one is a favorite due to the whole crazy distraction of "Invite the controversial...Do bats eat cats?" and the strength of that final line.

I think of this poem often when I see people's shadows made very large.

#3: William Carlos Williams

You may remember his short, modernist, imagery-heavy poems "The Red Wheelbarrow" or "This is Just to Say" (aka the plum one) from school.

My edition of his collected poems dates to 1991 and, oddly, did not have anything marking my favorites. Fortunately, it was very easy for me to bring to mind two poems that I have always loved.

This one is just beautiful.

And this one punches me in the gut every single time.

#4: Robert Frost

The author of such famous poems as "Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening," "The Road Not Taken," "Nothing Gold Can Stay," and "Mending Wall" hardly needs an introduction to American readers (and maybe not international readers either). I was curious which poems I had marked in my collection of his work...but to my surprise and disappointment, this is a book that got left behind at some point in my travels!

Note that I still have this book, of which the very most interesting part is the image on the front...

And I still have this (well-used) calculator user's guide from May 1993 for a calculator that I do not own/does not work.

The only saving grace here is that I have definitely NOT eliminated any of my literature anthologies from my book collection! I have a number of different ones, several of which have meaningful memories attached to them. For example, this one was a prize I won at a state-wide academic tournament in high school when I won first place in the American literature competition...

And it has my favorite Robert Frost poem in it - a poem that I memorized 30-something years ago and still recite to myself often. It is a touchstone for me in chaotic, stressful times.

#5: Ogden Nash

The American master of comedic light verse is not part of the school curriculum, but maybe he should be because his poems are inventive, insightful, and fun. I think his amusing animal poems are his best known, such as the "The Llama" (one my husband likes to quote) and the panther observation ("If called by a panther, / Don't anther").

This book from the early 1960s is one I picked up at the Goodwill bookstore in Tulsa, OK in the early 1990s.

In addition to the poems, there are a plethora of amusing drawings throughout (by illustrator John Alcorn). (Note: I didn't realize that this use of "like" in American English dates as far back as the 1960s!)

Of all Nash's poems, this is the one I always think of; even as a teenager, I knew that there was such truth in these lines. It earns extra credit with the Cheshire Cat and rabbit references, of course.

It feels weird to have left out the many, many American poets that I find essential (Emily Dickenson, where are you?), but I did enjoy revisiting my book collection...and this limitation did keep this post from taking 1,000 years to write/read!

Thanks for joining me on this jaunt through American poets viewed through the lens of the books on my shelves!

Now check out what other bloggers have to say about poetry:

Debbie: Debbie looks back at posts from 2016 where she made poems using online magnetic tiles - it was part of a craze she went through!  Who knew it would prove useful 10 years later??

Marsha: Marsha writes about her two favorite poems.  I wonder if you’ll be surprised!

Suzy: Suzy writes about the time she accidentally became a published poet, despite never really considering herself a poetry person!

Leslie: This month’s prompt threw Leslie for a loop / Stop by her blog for more of the scoop

Cat: Cat thinks she doesn't have a poetic bone in her body ... or does she?

Amy: Amy uses poetry for fun with friends and family.  Her grandmother has a published book of poems and her mom wrote a Christmas poem each year for her cards.

Now over to you...are you familiar with any of these poets and/or poems? Did you study any of them in school? Do you have any favorite poets from your own country? Do you own any books of poetry? Are there any books that you have been surprised to find are no longer in your collection? Do you have books in your collection that you really should pass on?

Blogs I link up with are listed here.