Whether denouncing the corporate world ("To Whom It May Concern"), or lustily joining it ("New Millennial Bad Ass"), to celebrating love in the face of smut ("Let's Make Out!"), Aptowicz dramatizes the hopes, humor and ambitions of young poet first steps into a very surreal 'real world.' This expanded version nearly triples the length of the original with previously unpublished works, including "Sass Manifesto," which was used to win the 2004 National Forsenics Championship in Poetry Interpretation.

    All the poems are in William Stafford's familiar, reflective voice, and some had been freshly typed at the time of Stafford's death in August of 1993. The book is hospitable to a full range of experiences, moods, stunts with language, tones, expressive landmarks, and intimacies with the universe. Long considered a major voice in twentieth century American poetry, William Stafford is also one of our nation's most popular poets.

    In her poem “Deliverance” about her daughter’s birth she writes “What is the word for when the light leaves the body?/What is the word for when it/at last, returns?”Through poems that are as unforgettably beautiful as they are accessible, Kate proves herself to truly be an exemplary voice in modern poetry. As easy to post on Instagram as they are to print out and frame, Kate’s words make women feel seen in their own bodies, in their own marriages, and in their own lives. Her poems are those you share with your mother, your daughter, your sister, and your friends.

    Physical and emotional privation, familial violence, racial enmity, and recurrent death are the features of this collection of poetry, set amid the landscape of the South.

    Between facing the traumas of her past and navigating daily life, the narrator of Magdalene yearns for the guidance of her spiritual teacher, a Christ figure, whose death she continues to grieve. Erotic, spirited, and searching for meaning, she is a woman striving to be the subject of her own life, fully human and alive to the sacred in the mortal world.

    Maurice Manning extolls the virtues of nature and its many gifts, and finds deep gratitude for the mysterious hand that created it all. that bare branch that branch made black by the rain the silver raindrop hanging from the black branch Boss I like that black branch I like that shiny raindrop Boss tell me if I’m wrong but it makes me think you’re looking right at me now isn’t that a lark for me to think you look that way upside down like a tree frog Boss I’m not surprised at all I wouldn’t doubt it for a minute you’re always up to something I’ll say one thing you’re all right all right you are even when you’re hanging Boss

    Dorothea Lasky is a daring truth-teller, naming names and boldly pushing the boundaries of confession. The secrets she tells are truths we recognize in ourselves: “Be scared of yourself / The real self / Is very scary.”Dorothea Lasky was born in St. Louis in 1978. She is the author of several chapbooks and has attended Harvard University and the University of Massachusetts Amherst.

    In the poem, Lowell's visit to the park leads to a series of associations that the dug-up park conjures. First, watching the construction of the underground parking garage beneath the Common makes him think about his childhood and how Boston had changed; in particular, the South Boston Aquarium that he'd visited as a child had recently been demolished in 1954.This leads him to think about the Robert Gould Shaw memorial and the history associated with the memorial (including Robert Gould Shaw and the all-black 54th Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry that he led). Finally, Lowell thinks of the then-controversial civil rights movement and the images of the integration of black and white schoolchildren that Lowell had recently seen on television.The final lines of the poem, which read, "The Aquarium is gone. Everywhere,/ giant finned cars nose forward like fish;/ a savage servility/ slides by on grease" are particularly well-known for their rather dark description of the large American cars that were popular at the time.

    Travel—actual and imaginary—remains a passion and inspiration, and in these pages the poet also finds “This sanctified ground / Here, yes, here / The dead solid center of the universe / At the heart of the heart of America.”

    With this unusual volume, arranged in six carefully paced movements to suggest the journey from death to recovery, Gallagher charges language with its utmost responsibilities: here poetry aspires deeply and urgently beyond its cultural marginality to embrace the paradox of sharing unshareable pain and to assume again an Orphic voice and a communal necessity.

    A. Powell since his remarkable trilogy of Tea, Lunch, and Cocktails, a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award so many of the best days seem minor forms of nearness that easily falls among the dropseed: a rind, a left-behind —from "no picnic" In these brilliant new poems from one of contemporary poetry's most intriguing, singular voices, D. A. Powell strikes out for the farther territories of love and comes back from those fields with loss, with flowers faded, "blossom blast and dieback." Chronic describes the flutter and cruelty of erotic encounter, temptation, and bitter heartsickness, but with Powell's deep lyric beauty and his own brand of dark wit.

    Poetry for those wishing to know someone special while seeking the greater challenge to know themselves.

    There was a woman.There was a cross. But in factthey have hung him too high to be touched.—from "A Woman Wipes the Face of Jesus"

    Lang Leav presents a completely new collection of poetry with a celestial theme in The Universe of Us.Planets, stars, and constellations feature prominently in this beautiful, original poetry collection from Lang Leav.  Inspired by the wonders of the universe, the best-selling poetess writes about love and loss, hope and hurt, being lost and found.  Lang's poetry encompasses the breadth of emotions we all experience and evokes universal feelings with her skillfully crafted words.

    Covering topics from love and heartbreak to chaos and self-discovery, each poem is laced in a cozy, magical energy that is sure to hold the reader suspended in the in-between.