Modern Poems: An Introduction to Poetry

by Ellmann, Richard; O'Clair, Robert

• ISBN13: 9780393959079
• ISBN10: 0393959074
• Edition: 2nd
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 1989-10-17
• Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company

Summary

This Second Edition is a thorough, thoughtful revision of the acclaimed Modern Poems. The editors have undertaken two major changes to the text, making the anthology a more useful resource in teaching the work of individual poets. Whereas the previous edition sometimes offered only a single poem by a given poet, the Second Edition presents at least three poems by each poet, with the few exceptions being poets with significantly long poems. The editors have also expanded the author headnotes to set forth one or two critical points that invite students into the poems. Other noteworthy changes include the addition of 38 new poets representing a diversity of traditions, from canonical poets like Lewis Carroll to contemporary ones like Rita Dove, and more careful attention paid to ethnic poetry and poetry by women.

Table of Contents

Preface to the First Edition	xxv	(2)
Publisher's Preface to the Second Edition	xxvii	(4)
Acknowledgments	xxxi	(2)
READING POEMS	xxxiii
Words and Word Order	xxxiii	(4)
Words	xxxiii	(2)
Word Order	xxxv	(1)
Levels of Diction	xxxvi	(1)
Speaker and Tone	xxxvii	(4)
The Speaker	xxxvii	(1)
The Listener	xxxviii	(1)
Tone	xxxix	(11)
Irony	xl	(1)
Figurative Language	xli	(8)
Image and Figurative Language	xli	(1)
Simile	xlii	(1)
Metaphor	xliii	(1)
Other Kinds of Figurative Language	xliv	(1)
Symbol	xliv	(2)
Myth and Archetype	xlvi	(1)
Allusion	xlvii	(2)
Sound and Form	xlix	(12)
Rhythm	xlix	(1)
Meter	l	(2)
Other Rhythmic Forms	lii	(1)
Free Verse	liii	(4)
Traditional Forms of Free Verse	liv	(1)
Modern Free Verse	lv	(2)
Rhyme	lvii	(3)
Sound Effects Within the Line	lx	(1)
Stanza and Verse Paragraph	lxi	(1)
Poetic Kinds, Forms, and Stanzas: A Glossary	lxii	(3)
Index of Terms	lxv
WALT WHITMAN (1819-1892)	1	(19)
Song of Myself	3	(13)
1-14	3	(8)
46-52	11	(5)
When I Heard at the Close of the Day	16	(1)
Cavalry Crossing a Ford	16	(1)
A Sight in Camp in the Daybreak Gray and Dim	17	(1)
Respondez!	17	(2)
To a Locomotive in Winter	19	(1)
EMILY DICKINSON (1830-1886)	20	(8)
I Never Lost As Much But Twice (J. 49)	23	(1)
Wild Nights--Wild Nights! (J. 249)	23	(1)
There's a Certain Slant of Light (J. 258)	23	(1)
After Great Pain, a Formal Feeling Comes (J. 341)	24	(1)
This Is My Letter to the World (J. 441)	24	(1)
I Heard a Fly Buzz--When I Died (J. 465)	24	(1)
The Brain--Is Wider than the Sky (J. 632)	25	(1)
Because I Could Not Stop for Death (J. 712)	25	(1)
A Narrow Fellow in the Grass (J. 986)	26	(1)
In Winter in My Room (J. 1670)	27	(1)
My Life Closed Twice Before Its Close (J. 1732)	27	(1)
LEWIS CARROLL (1832-1898)	28	(10)
[A Long Tale]	30	(1)
Jabberwocky	30	(3)
Jabberwocky	31	(1)
[Humpty Dumpty's Explication]	31	(2)
The Walrus and the Carpenter	33	(3)
The White Knight's Song	36	(2)
THOMAS HARDY (1840-1928)	38	(12)
Hap	40	(1)
Neutral Tones	40	(1)
Drummer Hodge	41	(1)
The Subalterns	41	(1)
The Darkling Thrush	42	(1)
Channel Firing	43	(1)
The Convergence of the Twain	44	(1)
I Found Her Out There	45	(1)
The Voice	46	(1)
Lines to a Movement in Mozart's E-Flat Symphony	46	(1)
The Oxen	47	(1)
In Time of "The Breaking of Nations"	48	(1)
The Harbour Bridge	48	(1)
He Never Expected Much	49	(1)
GERARD MANLEY HOPKINS (1844-1889)	50	(8)
Heaven-Haven	52	(1)
The Habit of Perfection	52	(1)
God's Grandeur	53	(1)
The Windhover	53	(1)
Pied Beauty	54	(1)
Binsey Poplars	54	(1)
Felix Randal	55	(1)
Spring and Fall	55	(1)
[Carrion Comfort]	56	(1)
[No Worst, There Is None. Pitched Past Pitch of Grief]	56	(1)
[I Wake and Feel the Fell of Dark, Not Day]	57	(1)
[Thou Art Indeed Just, Lord, If I Contend]	57	(1)
A. E. HOUSMAN (1859-1936)	58	(9)
Loveliest of Trees, the Cherry Now	60	(1)
To an Athlete Dying Young	60	(1)
Terence, This Is Stupid Stuff	61	(2)
The Chestnut Casts His Flambeaux	63	(1)
Eight O'Clock	63	(1)
Hell Gate	64	(2)
Epitaph on an Army of Mercenaries	66	(1)
Tell Me Not Here, It Needs Not Saying	66	(1)
WILLIAM BUTLER YEATS (1865-1939)	67	(31)
The Song of the Happy Shepherd	69	(2)
Down by the Salley Gardens	71	(1)
To the Rose upon the Rood of Time	71	(1)
The Lake Isle of Innisfree	72	(1)
When You Are Old	72	(1)
Who Goes with Fergus?	73	(1)
The Man Who Dreamed of Faeryland	73	(1)
Michael Robartes Bids His Beloved Be at Peace	74	(1)
The Cap and Bells	75	(1)
Adam's Curse	76	(1)
No Second Troy	77	(1)
On Hearing that the Students of Our New University Have Joined the Agitation Against Immoral Literature	77	(1)
Friends	77	(1)
September 1913	78	(1)
The Magi	79	(1)
A Coat	79	(1)
The Wild Swans at Coole	80	(1)
An Irish Airman Foresees His Death	80	(1)
Easter 1916	81	(2)
The Second Coming	83	(1)
A Prayer for My Daughter	83	(2)
Leda and the Swan	85	(1)
Sailing to Byzantium	86	(1)
Among School Children	87	(2)
Coole Park and Ballylee, 1931	89	(1)
Byzantium	90	(1)
Crazy Jane Talks with the Bishop	91	(1)
Lapis Lazuli	92	(1)
Long-Legged Fly	93	(1)
The Circus Animals' Desertion	94	(1)
Under Ben Bulben	95	(3)
RUDYARD KIPLING (1865-1930)	98	(12)
Danny Deever	100	(1)
The Widow at Windsor	100	(1)
Shillin' a Day	101	(1)
The Derelict	102	(2)
Recessional	104	(1)
The Prodigal Son	105	(1)
A Song to Mithras	106	(1)
The Runes on Weland's Sword	106	(1)
The Way through the Woods	107	(1)
The Nurses	108	(1)
The Storm Cone	109	(1)
EDGAR LEE MASTERS (1868-1950)	110	(3)
SPOON RIVER ANTHOLOGY	111	(1)
Elsa Wertman	111	(1)
Hamilton Greene	111	(1)
Anne Rutledge	112	(1)
Lucinda Matlock	112	(1)
EDWIN ARLINGTON ROBINSON (1869-1935)	113	(7)
Luke Havergal	114	(1)
Supremacy	115	(1)
Miniver Cheevy	115	(1)
For a Dead Lady	116	(1)
Eros Turannos	117	(1)
The Dark Hills	118	(1)
Mr. Flood's Party	118	(1)
The Sheaves	119	(1)
ROBERT FROST (1874-1963)	120	(21)
Mending Wall	122	(1)
After Apple-Picking	123	(1)
The Road Not Taken	124	(1)
An Old Man's Winter Night	125	(1)
The Oven Bird	126	(1)
Birches	126	(1)
Range-Finding	127	(1)
The Witch of Coos	128	(3)
Fire and Ice	131	(1)
Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening	131	(1)
To Earthward	132	(1)
Acquainted with the Night	132	(1)
Two Tramps in Mud Time	133	(1)
Desert Places	134	(1)
Neither Out Far nor In Deep	135	(1)
Design	135	(1)
Provide, Provide	136	(1)
The Bearer of Evil Tidings	136	(1)
Never Again Would Birds' Song Be the Same	137	(1)
The Subverted Flower	138	(1)
The Gift Outright	139	(1)
Directive	140	(1)
CARL SANDBURG (1878-1967)	141	(4)
Chicago	143	(1)
Grass	143	(1)
Cool Tombs	144	(1)
Gargoyle	144	(1)
EDWARD THOMAS (1878-1917)	145	(4)
The Owl	145	(1)
October	146	(1)
The Green Roads	146	(1)
The Gallows	147	(1)
February Afternoon	148	(1)
The Gypsy	148	(1)
WALLACE STEVENS (1879-1955)	149	(19)
Sunday Morning	150	(3)
Peter Quince at the Clavier	153	(2)
Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird	155	(2)
Anecdote of the Jar	157	(1)
The Snow Man	157	(1)
Bantams in Pine-Woods	158	(1)
The Emperor of Ice-Cream	158	(1)
The Idea of Order at Key West	159	(1)
Farewell to Florida	160	(1)
The Man with the Blue Guitar	161	(1)
I ("The man bent over his guitar")	161	(1)
A Rabbit as King of the Ghosts	162	(1)
The Man on the Dump	162	(2)
The Sense of the Sleight-of-Hand Man	164	(1)
Of Modern Poetry	164	(1)
A Quiet Normal Life	165	(1)
To an Old Philosopher in Rome	165	(2)
The Plain Sense of Things	167	(1)
WILLIAM CARLOS WILLIAMS (1883-1963)	168	(31)
Tract	170	(2)
The Widow's Lament in Springtime	172	(1)
The Great Figure	172	(1)
Spring and All	173	(1)
The Red Wheelbarrow	173	(1)
Portrait of a Lady	174	(1)
This Is Just to Say	174	(1)
The Yachts	174	(1)
The Young Housewife	175	(1)
Raleigh Was Right	176	(1)
The Dance	176	(1)
Burning the Christmas Greens	177	(2)
PATERSON	178	(1)
Book I. The Delineaments of the Giants	179	(4)
I ("Paterson lies in the valley...")	179	(3)
II ("They begin!")	182	(1)
III ("Thought clambers up")	183	(1)
Book II. Sunday in the Park	183	(13)
I ("Outside")	183	(13)
The Ivy Crown	196	(2)
Pictures from Breugel	198	(1)
II. Landscape with the Fall of Icarus	198	(1)
VI. Haymaking	199	(1)
D. H. LAWRENCE (1885-1930)	199	(15)
The Wild Common	201	(1)
Love on the Farm	202	(2)
The Bride	204	(1)
Gloire de Dijon	204	(1)
Piano	205	(1)
Snake	205	(2)
When I Read Shakespeare	207	(1)
Middle of the World	208	(1)
Red Geranium and Godly Mignonette	208	(1)
Whales Weep Not!	209	(1)
Bavarian Gentians	210	(1)
The Ship of Death	210	(4)
EZRA POUND (1885-1972)	214	(21)
Portrait d'une Femme	216	(1)
The Return	217	(1)
The River-Merchant's Wife: A Letter	217	(1)
A Pact	218	(1)
In a Station of the Metro	218	(1)
Hugh Selwyn Mauberley: Life and Contacts	219	(9)
THE CANTOS	226	(2)
I ("And then went down to the ship")	228	(2)
LXXXI ("Zeus lies in Ceres' bosom")	230	(5)
H. D. (Hilda Doolittle) (1886-1961)	235	(8)
Sea Rose	236	(1)
Oread	236	(1)
Helen	237	(1)
Fragment Sixty-Eight	237	(2)
Tribute to the Angels	239	(1)
36-41 ("Ah (you say), this is Holy Wisdom")	239	(4)
SIEGFRIED SASSOON (1886-1967)	243	(2)
"Blighters"	244	(1)
The General	244	(1)
Everyone Sang	244	(1)
On Passing the New Menin Gate	245	(1)
ROBINSON JEFFERS (1887-1962)	245	(7)
Shine, Perishing Republic	247	(1)
Fawn's Foster-Mother	247	(1)
Hurt Hawks	248	(1)
New Mexican Mountain	249	(1)
Ave Caesar	249	(1)
The Purse-Seine	250	(1)
Shiva	251	(1)
The Deer Lay Down Their Bones	251	(1)
Vulture	252	(1)
EDWIN MUIR (1887-1959)	252	(5)
Ballad of Hector in Hades	254	(1)
One Foot in Eden	255	(1)
The Horses	255	(2)
MARIANNE MOORE (1887-1972)	257	(7)
The Fish	258	(1)
Poetry	259	(1)
A Grave	260	(1)
The Pangolin	261	(2)
What Are Years?	263	(1)
JOHN CROWE RANSOM (1888-1974)	264	(6)
Bells for John Whiteside's Daughter	265	(1)
Here Lies a Lady	266	(1)
Captain Carpenter	266	(2)
Piazza Piece	268	(1)
Dead Boy	268	(1)
The Equilibrists	269	(1)
T. S. ELIOT (1888-1965)	270	(31)
The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock	272	(4)
Whispers of Immortality	276	(1)
Sweeney Among the Nightingales	277	(1)
Gerontion	278	(2)
The Waste Land	280	(14)
Landscapes	294	(1)
I. New Hampshire	294	(1)
V. Cape Ann	295	(1)
Little Gidding	295	(6)
CLAUDE MCKAY (1890-1948)	301	(2)
The Tropics in New York	302	(1)
If We Must Die	302	(1)
America	303	(1)
The Harlem Dancer	303	(1)
ISAAC ROSENBERG (1890-1918)	303	(5)
The Mirror	304	(1)
Break of Day in the Trenches	304	(1)
Louse Hunting	305	(1)
Returning, We Hear the Larks	306	(1)
Dead Man's Dump	306	(2)
EDNA ST. VINCENT MILLAY (1892-1950)	308	(3)
First Fig	309	(1)
Recuerdo	309	(1)
[Love Is Not All: It Is Not Meat nor Drink]	309	(1)
[Oh, Sleep Forever in the Latmian Cave]	310	(1)
To a Calvinist in Bali	310	(1)
WILFRED OWEN (1893-1918)	311	(5)
Anthem for Doomed Youth	312	(1)
Dulce et Decorum Est	312	(1)
Strange Meeting	313	(1)
Greater Love	314	(1)
Disabled	315	(1)
E. E. CUMMINGS (1894-1962)	316	(10)
[All in green went my love riding]	318	(1)
[O sweet spontaneous]	319	(1)
[the Cambridge ladies who live in furnished souls]	319	(1)
[a man who had fallen among thieves]	320	(1)
[i sing of Olaf glad and big]	320	(1)
[the way to hump a cow is not]	321	(1)
[my father moved through dooms of love]	322	(2)
[plato told]	324	(1)
[maggie and milly and molly and may]	325	(1)
[now comes the good rain farmers pray for (and]	325	(1)
[out of midsummer's blazing most not night]	326	(1)
ROBERT GRAVES (1895-1985)	326	(7)
The Cool Web	328	(1)
Ogres and Pygmies	328	(1)
Ulysses	329	(1)
Down, Wanton, Down!	330	(1)
The Devil's Advice to Story-Tellers	330	(1)
To Juan at the Winter Solstice	331	(1)
The Persian Version	332	(1)
The Blue-Fly	333	(1)
LOUISE BOGAN (1897-1970)	333	(3)
Medusa	334	(1)
Women	335	(1)
The Dream	335	(1)
The Meeting	336	(1)
HART CRANE (1899-1933)	336	(10)
Chaplinesque	338	(1)
At Melville's Tomb	339	(1)
Voyages	339	(4)
THE BRIDGE	343	(1)
Proem: To Brooklyn Bridge	343	(2)
Royal Palm	345	(1)
The Broken Tower	345	(1)
ALLEN TATE (1899-1979)	346	(9)
Ode to the Confederate Dead	348	(3)
To the Lacedemonians	351	(2)
The Swimmers	353	(2)
YVOR WINTERS (1900-1968)	355	(4)
John Sutter	356	(1)
Sir Gawaine and the Green Knight	357	(1)
Time and the Garden	358	(1)
LANGSTON HUGHES (1902-1967)	359	(5)
The Negro Speaks of Rivers	360	(1)
The Weary Blues	360	(1)
Brass Spittoons	361	(1)
Morning After	362	(1)
Madam's Past History	362	(1)
Theme for English B	363	(1)
STEVIE SMITH (1902-1971)	364	(5)
Not Waving But Drowning	365	(1)
Was He Married?	365	(2)
Admire Cranmer!	367	(1)
Thoughts about the Person from Porlock	367	(1)
To Carry the Child	368	(1)
COUNTEE CULLEN (1903-1946)	369	(4)
Yet Do I Marvel	370	(1)
Incident	370	(1)
Heritage	371	(2)
PATRICK KAVANAGH (1904-1967)	373	(3)
Tinker's Wife	374	(1)
Inniskeen Road: July Evening	375	(1)
Canal Bank Walk	375	(1)
Come Dance with Kitty Stobling	375	(1)
In Memory of My Mother	376	(1)
EARL BIRNEY (b. 1904)	376	(9)
The Bear on the Delhi Road	377	(1)
The Gray Woods Exploding	378	(7)
ROBERT PENN WARREN (1905-1989)	385	(8)
Bearded Oaks	387	(1)
Mexico Is a Foreign Country: Four Studies in Naturalism	388	(1)
IV. The Mango on the Mango Tree	388	(1)
Riddle in the Garden	389	(1)
Flaubert in Egypt	390	(2)
There's a Grandfather's Clock in the Hall	392	(1)
STANLEY KUNITZ (b. 1905)	393	(5)
River Road	394	(1)
The Wellfleet Whale	395	(3)
JOHN BETJEMAN (1906-1984)	398	(6)
The Arrest of Oscar Wilde at the Cadogan Hotel	399	(1)
An Incident in the Early Life of Ebenezer Jones, Poet, 1828	400	(1)
A Subaltern's Love-Song	401	(1)
The Cottage Hospital	402	(1)
False Security	403	(1)
WILLIAM EMPSON (1906-1984)	404	(4)
Villanelle	405	(1)
Legal Fiction	406	(1)
Ignorance of Death	406	(1)
Missing Dates	407	(1)
W. H. AUDEN (1907-1973)	408	(19)
The Letter	409	(1)
Five Songs	410	(1)
V. ("O where are you going?")	410	(1)
The Wanderer	410	(1)
Adolescence	411	(1)
Our Hunting Fathers	412	(1)
As I Walked Out One Evening	412	(2)
Lullaby	414	(1)
Musee des Beaux Arts	415	(1)
In Memory of W. B. Yeats	416	(2)
In Memory of Sigmund Freud	418	(2)
Mundus et Infans	420	(2)
In Praise of Limestone	422	(2)
Their Lonely Betters	424	(1)
The Shield of Achilles	424	(2)
A Lullaby	426	(1)
A. D. HOPE (b. 1907)	427	(7)
Australia	428	(1)
Observation Car	429	(1)
The Lingam and the Yoni	430	(1)
Imperial Adam	431	(2)
Advice to Young Ladies	433	(1)
LOUIS MACNEICE (1907-1963)	434	(4)
Snow	435	(1)
Bagpipe Music	435	(1)
Brother Fire	436	(1)
The Libertine	437	(1)
Variation on Heraclitus	438	(1)
THEODORE ROETHKE (1908-1963)	438	(8)
Cuttings	439	(1)
Cuttings (later)	439	(1)
My Papa's Waltz	440	(1)
Dolor	440	(1)
The Waking	440	(1)
Frau Bauman, Frau Schmidt, and Frau Schwartze	441	(1)
I Knew a Woman	442	(1)
Wish for a Young Wife	442	(1)
The Far Field	443	(2)
In a Dark Time	445	(1)
A. M. KLEIN (1909-1972)	446	(5)
Portrait of the Poet as Landscape	446	(5)
CHARLES OLSON (1910-1970)	451	(7)
THE MAXIMUS POEMS	452	(1)
I, Maximus of Gloucester, to You	452	(3)
Maximus, to Gloucester	455	(3)
Letter 2	455	(3)
ELIZABETH BISHOP (1911-1979)	458	(10)
The Man-Moth	458	(1)
The Fish	459	(2)
Over 2000 Illustrations and a Complete Concordance	461	(2)
The Armadillo	463	(1)
In the Waiting Room	464	(2)
Poem ("About the size of an old-style dollar bill")	466	(1)
One Art	467	(1)
JOSEPHINE MILES (1911-1985)	468	(4)
Preliminary to Classroom Lecture	468	(1)
Belief	469	(1)
Reason	469	(1)
[The Entrepreneur Chicken Shed His Tail Feathers, Surplus]	469	(1)
Fields of Learning	470	(2)
IRVING LAYTON (b. 1912)	472	(3)
The Birth of Tragedy	472	(1)
A Tall Man Executes a Jig	473	(2)
WILLIAM EVERSON (b. 1912)	475	(9)
Year's End	476	(1)
The Poet Is Dead	477	(6)
Tendril in the Mesh	483	(1)
IV. ("Daughter of earth and child of the wave")	483	(1)
Runoff	483	(1)
ROBERT HAYDEN (1913-1980)	484	(6)
The Ballad of Sue Ellen Westerfield	485	(1)
Mourning Poem for the Queen of Sunday	486	(1)
Those Winter Sundays	487	(1)
"Mystery Boy' Looks for Kin in Nashville"	487	(1)
A Plague of Starlings	488	(1)
A Letter from Phillis Wheatley	489	(1)
Bone-Flower Elegy	490	(1)
DUDLEY RANDALL (b. 1914)	490	(5)
Ballad of Birmingham	491	(1)
Booker T. and W. E. B.	492	(1)
A Poet Is Not a Jukebox	493	(2)
WILLIAM STAFFORD (b. 1914)	495	(3)
Traveling through the Dark	495	(1)
At the Bomb Testing Site	496	(1)
Monuments for a Friendly Girl at a Tenth Grade Party	496	(1)
Report to Crazy Horse	496	(2)
After Arguing against the Contention That Art Must Come from Discontent	498	(1)
RANDALL JARRELL (1914-1965)	498	(7)
The Death of the Ball Turret Gunner	500	(1)
Eighth Air Force	500	(1)
A Girl in a Library	500	(3)
Next Day	503	(2)
JOHN BERRYMAN (1914-1972)	505	(4)
A Professor's Song	506	(1)
THE DREAM SONGS	506	(3)
14 ("Life, friends is boring. We must not say so")	506	(1)
16 ("Henry's pelt was put on sundry walls")	507	(1)
75 ("Turning it over, considering, like a madman")	507	(1)
76 Henry's Confession	508	(1)
149 ("This world is gradually becoming a place")	508	(1)
312 ("I have moved to Dublin to have it out with you")	509	(1)
DYLAN THOMAS (1914-1953)	509	(7)
The Hand That Signed the Paper	511	(1)
The Force That through the Green Fuse Drives the Flower	511	(1)
The Hunchback in the Park	512	(1)
A Refusal to Mourn the Death, by Fire, of a Child in London	513	(1)
Fern Hill	513	(2)
In My Craft or Sullen Art	515	(1)
Do Not Go Gentle into That Good Night	515	(1)
JUDITH WRIGHT (b. 1915)	516	(3)
Bora Ring	516	(1)
Flood Year	517	(1)
"Dove-Love"	517	(1)
The Beanstalk, Meditated Later	518	(1)
Australia 1970	519	(1)
P. K. PAGE (b. 1916)	519	(7)
The Stenographers	520	(1)
Images of Angels	521	(2)
Photos of a Saltmine	523	(1)
Kaleidoscope	524	(2)
ROBERT LOWELL (1917-1977)	526	(13)
The Quaker Graveyard in Nantucket	528	(4)
Memories of West Street and Lepke	532	(1)
"To Speak of Woe That Is in Marriage"	533	(1)
Skunk Hour	534	(1)
For the Union Dead	535	(2)
Ezra Pound	537	(1)
Robert Frost	537	(1)
After the Convention	538	(1)
Dolphin	538	(1)
Epilogue	538	(1)
GWENDOLYN BROOKS (b. 1917)	539	(8)
A Song in the Front Yard	540	(1)
Sadie and Maud	540	(1)
The Lovers of the Poor	541	(2)
Boy Breaking Glass	543	(1)
The Blackstone Rangers	544	(2)
Young Africans	546	(1)
The Boy Died in My Alley	546	(1)
AL PURDY (b. 1918)	547	(5)
Winter Walking	548	(1)
The Madwoman on the Train	549	(1)
Lament for the Dorsets	550	(2)
Spinning	552	(1)
ROBERT DUNCAN (1919-1988)	552	(5)
Poetry, a Natural Thing	554	(1)
Passage over Water	555	(1)
Childhood's Retreat	555	(1)
A Little Language	556	(1)
WILLIAM MEREDITH (b. 1919)	557	(4)
On Falling Asleep by Firelight	557	(1)
Bachelor	558	(1)
Crossing Over	559	(1)
Dying Away	560	(1)
KEITH DOUGLAS (1920-1944)	561	(3)
Aristocrats	561	(1)
Vergissmeinnicht	562	(1)
Soissons	563	(1)
Simplify Me When I'm Dead	563	(1)
HOWARD NEMEROV (b. 1920)	564	(4)
I Only Am Escaped Alone to Tell Thee	565	(1)
Wolves in the Zoo	566	(1)
Reading Pornography in Old Age	566	(1)
More Joy in Heaven	567	(1)
AMY CLAMPITT (b. 1920)	568	(4)
Beach Glass	568	(1)
Gooseberry Fool	569	(1)
A Cure at Porlock	570	(2)
RICHARD WILBUR (b. 1921)	572	(7)
The Pardon	573	(1)
Grasse: The Olive Trees	573	(1)
The Death of a Toad	574	(1)
Ceremony	575	(1)
Love Calls Us to the Things of This World	575	(1)
Pangloss's Song	576	(1)
Playboy	577	(1)
The Writer	578	(1)
PHILIP LARKIN (1922-1985)	579	(8)
Church Going	580	(2)
The Whitsun Weddings	582	(2)
MCMXIV	584	(1)
Sunny Prestatyn	585	(1)
High Windows	585	(1)
This Be the Verse	586	(1)
Sad Steps	586	(1)
The Explosion	587	(1)
ANTHONY HECHT (b. 1923)	587	(5)
"More Light! More Light!"	588	(1)
Sestina d'Inverno	589	(1)
The Deodand	590	(2)
An Old Malediction	592	(1)
JAMES DICKEY (b. 1923)	592	(8)
The Hospital Window	593	(2)
Buckdancer's Choice	595	(1)
Falling	596	(4)
DENISE LEVERTOV (b. 1923)	600	(6)
The Dog of Art	601	(1)
Matins	601	(2)
Song for Ishtar	603	(1)
Goodbye to Tolerance	604	(1)
Prisoners	605	(1)
Caedmon	605	(1)
RICHARD HUGO (1923-1982)	606	(7)
The Way a Ghost Dissolves	608	(1)
The Lady in Kicking Horse Reservoir	609	(1)
Degrees of Gray in Philipsburg	610	(1)
The Freaks at Spurgin Road Field	611	(1)
Salt Water Story	612	(1)
MAXINE KUMIN (b. 1925)	613	(4)
Seeing the Bones	613	(1)
Spree	614	(2)
Video Cuisine	616	(1)
A. R. AMMONS (b. 1926)	617	(8)
Corsons Inlet	618	(3)
Small Song	621	(1)
The City Limits	621	(1)
Easter Morning	621	(2)
Singling & Doubling Together	623	(1)
Motion's Holdings	624	(1)
JAMES MERRILL (b. 1926)	625	(13)
The Broken Home	626	(2)
The Victor Dog	628	(2)
THE CHANGING LIGHT AT SANDOVER	630	(1)
The Book of Ephraim	630	(2)
B	630	(2)
Mirabell's Books of Number	632	(1)
8.1 ("It starts in the small hours. An interlude")	632	(1)
8.2 ("7 MORE TO GO. DID THOSE FIRST VISITORS TO THE SICKROOM")	633	(1)
Coda: The Higher Keys	633	(4)
The Ballroom at Sandover	633	(4)
The Pier: Under Pisces	637	(1)
ROBERT CREELEY (b. 1926)	638	(4)
A Wicker Basket	639	(1)
The Window	640	(1)
"I Keep to Myself Such Measures..."	640	(1)
Self-Portrait	641	(1)
The Faces	641	(1)
ALLEN GINSBERG (b. 1926)	642	(14)
Howl	644	(5)
I ("I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness...")	646	(3)
A Supermarket in California	649	(1)
America	650	(2)
To Aunt Rose	652	(2)
Mugging	654	(2)
FRANK O'HARA (1926-1966)	656	(3)
Poem ("The eager note on my door said `Call me'")	657	(1)
The Day Lady Died	657	(1)
Why I Am Not a Painter	658	(1)
ROBERT BLY (b. 1926)	659	(3)
Johnson's Cabinet Watched by Ants	660	(1)
Evolution from the Fish	660	(1)
My Father's Wedding	661	(1)
GALWAY KINNELL (b. 1927)	662	(7)
Flower Herding on Mount Monadnock	663	(2)
The Correspondence School Instructor Says Goodbye to His Poetry Students	665	(1)
The Seekonk Woods	666	(3)
JOHN ASHBERY (b. 1927)	669	(6)
The Instruction Manual	670	(2)
The Tennis Court Oath	672	(1)
Knocking Around	673	(1)
Paradoxes and Oxymorons	674	(1)
Hard Times	675	(1)
W. S. MERWIN (b. 1927)	675	(6)
Leviathan	677	(1)
The Drunk in the Furnace	678	(1)
Home for Thanksgiving	678	(1)
Footprints on the Glacier	679	(1)
The Burnt Child	680	(1)
JAMES WRIGHT (1927-1980)	681	(7)
Autumn Begins in Martins Ferry, Ohio	682	(1)
The Minneapolis Poem	682	(2)
In Response to a Rumor That the Oldest Whorehouse in Wheeling, West Virginia, Has Been Condemned	684	(1)
A Secret Gratitude	685	(2)
The Journey	687	(1)
PHILIP LEVINE (b. 1928)	688	(3)
To a Child Trapped in a Barbershop	689	(1)
They Feed They Lion	689	(1)
The Life Ahead	690	(1)
Genius	691	(1)
ANNE SEXTON (1928-1974)	691	(4)
The Truth the Dead Know	692	(1)
All My Pretty Ones	693	(1)
The Starry Night	694	(1)
ADRIENNE RICH (b. 1929)	695	(14)
Aunt Jennifer's Tigers	697	(1)
Snapshots of a Daughter-in-Law	697	(4)
Orion	701	(1)
Diving into the Wreck	702	(2)
Twenty-One Love Poems	704	(2)
II ("I wake up in your bed. I know I have been dreaming.")	704	(1)
XI ("Every peak is a crater. This is the law of volcanoes")	704	(1)
(The Floating Poem, Unnumbered)	705	(1)
XX ("That conversation we were always on the edge")	705	(1)
XXI ("The dark lintels, the blue and foreign stones")	705	(1)
Yom Kippur 1984	706	(3)
THOM GUNN (b. 1929)	709	(4)
The Byrnies	710	(1)
My Sad Captains	710	(1)
Moly	711	(1)
Autobiography	712	(1)
Donahue's Sister	712	(1)
DEREK WALCOTT (b. 1930)	713	(10)
A Far Cry from Africa	714	(1)
Codicil	715	(1)
Frederiksted, Dusk	716	(1)
Port of Spain	717	(1)
The Fortunate Traveller	717	(6)
GARY SNYDER (b. 1930)	723	(7)
Riprap	724	(1)
Four Poems for Robin	724	(2)
Axe Handles	726	(1)
Getting in the Wood	727	(1)
Geese Gone Beyond	728	(1)
The Grand Entry	728	(1)
Old Woman Nature	729	(1)
TED HUGHES (b. 1930)	730	(5)
The Thought-Fox	731	(1)
An Otter	731	(1)
Wodwo	732	(1)
Crow's First Lesson	733	(1)
Roe Deer	733	(1)
Orf	734	(1)
GEOFFREY HILL (b. 1932)	735	(5)
In Memory of Jane Fraser	735	(1)
Requiem for the Plantagenet Kings	736	(1)
September Song	736	(1)
Funeral Music	737	(1)
6 ("My little son, when you could command marvels")	737	(1)
8 ("Not as we are but as we must appear")	737	(1)
The Imaginative Life	738	(1)
An Apology for the Revival of Christian Architecture in England	738	(2)
1. Quaint Mazes	738	(1)
9. The Laurel Axe	739	(1)
11. Idylls of the King	739	(1)
SYLVIA PLATH (1932-1963)	740	(7)
Lady Lazarus	741	(3)
Ariel	744	(1)
Daddy	744	(2)
Blackberrying	746	(1)
AUDRE LORDE (b. 1934)	747	(6)
Coal	748	(1)
Love Poem	749	(1)
The Women of Dan Dance with Swords in Their Hands to Mark the Time When They Were Warriors	749	(1)
Power	750	(1)
Beams	751	(2)
IMAMU AMIRI BARAKA (LeRoi Jones) (b. 1934)	753	(4)
Political Poem	754	(1)
Legacy	755	(1)
Babylon Revisited	755	(1)
A New Reality Is Better Than a New Movie!	756	(1)
JON STALLWORTHY (b. 1935)	757	(6)
A poem about Poems About Vietnam	758	(1)
A Letter from Berlin	759	(1)
The Almond Tree	760	(3)
JUNE JORDAN (b. 1936)	763	(4)
Onesided Dialog	764	(1)
You Came with Shells	764	(1)
Second Poem from Nicaragua Libre: War Zone	765	(1)
July 4, 1984: For Buck	765	(1)
DeLiza Spend the Day in the City	766	(1)
TONY HARRISON (b. 1937)	767	(6)
THE SCHOOL OF ELOQUENCE	768	(1)
Heredity	768	(1)
On Not Being Milton	768	(1)
Me Tarzan	769	(1)
Book Ends	770	(1)
Turns	771	(1)
Marked with D	771	(1)
Self Justification	772	(1)
Lines to My Grandfathers	772	(1)
DIANE WAKOSKI (b. 1937)	773	(6)
Belly Dancer	774	(1)
Thanking My Mother for Piano Lessons	775	(3)
A Valentine for Ben Franklin Who Drives a Truck in California	778	(1)
MICHAEL HARPER (b. 1938)	779	(8)
American History	780	(1)
Debridement	780	(7)
SEAMUS HEANEY (b. 1939)	787	(10)
Requiem for the Croppies	788	(1)
Bogland	788	(1)
Punishment	789	(2)
The Strand at Lough Beg	791	(1)
The Otter	792	(1)
The Harvest Bow	793	(1)
Station Island	793	(2)
XII ("Like a convalescent, I took the hand")	793	(2)
Alphabets	795	(2)
MARGARET ATWOOD (b. 1939)	797	(7)
This Is a Photograph of Me	798	(1)
The Animals in that Country	798	(1)
Daguerreotype Taken in Old Age	799	(1)
Footnote to the Amnesty Report on Torture	800	(2)
Variations on the Word Love	802	(1)
Spelling	802	(2)
ROBERT PINSKY (b. 1940)	804	(6)
Doctor Frolic	804	(1)
The Figured Wheel	805	(1)
The Living	806	(2)
The Questions	808	(2)
MARILYN HACKER (b. 1942)	810	(3)
Canzone	810	(1)
Runaways Cafe II	811	(1)
Mythology	812	(1)
Coda	812	(1)
("Did you love well what very soon you left?")	812	(1)
DAVE SMITH (b. 1942)	813	(4)
Hole, Where Once in Passion We Swam	813	(1)
The Roundhouse Voices	814	(2)
Snapshot of a Crab-Picker Among Barrels Spilling Over, Apparently at the End of Her Shift	816	(1)
MICHAEL ONDAATJE (b. 1943)	817	(6)
Elizabeth	818	(1)
Letters & Other Worlds	819	(2)
Burning Hills	821	(1)
(Inner Tube)	822	(1)
JAMES TATE (b. 1943)	823	(5)
The Blue Booby	824	(1)
The Wheelchair Butterfly	825	(1)
The Lost Pilot	826	(1)
Poem to Some of My Recent Poems	827	(1)
A Wedding	828	(1)
CRAIG RAINE (b. 1944)	828	(5)
Nature Study	829	(1)
A Martian Sends a Postcard Home	830	(1)
An Attempt at Jealousy	831	(2)
NORMAN DUBIE (b. 1945)	833	(5)
The Czar's Last Christmas Letter: A Barn in the Urals	833	(2)
Elizabeth's War with the Christmas Bear	835	(1)
Elegy for Wright & Hugo	836	(1)
Lamentations	837	(1)
LESLIE MARMON SILKO (b. 1948)	838	(4)
[It Was a Long Time Before]	839	(1)
In Cold Storm Light	840	(1)
Toe'osh: A Laguna Coyote Story	840	(2)
MICHAEL BLUMENTHAL (b. 1949)	842	(3)
Inventors	843	(1)
Abandoning Your Car in a Snowstorm: Rosslyn, Virginia	844	(1)
Back from the Word-Processing Course, I Say to My Old Typewriter	845	(1)
JAMES FENTON (b. 1949)	845	(6)
A German Requiem	846	(2)
Dead Soldiers	848	(2)
God, A Poem	850	(1)
PAUL MULDOON (b. 1951)	851	(4)
The Big House	852	(1)
The Weepies	853	(1)
Making the Move	853	(1)
The Right Arm	854	(1)
Brock	854	(1)
GARY SOTO (b. 1952)	855	(6)
The Elements of San Joaquin	856	(1)
Wind [2]	856	(1)
Rain	857	(1)
The Map	857	(1)
The Tale of Sunlight	858	(1)
Making Money: Drought Year in Minkler, California	859	(1)
Oranges	860	(1)
RITA DOVE (b. 1952)	861	(6)
The House Slave	861	(1)
Banneker	862	(1)
Parsley	863	(2)
The Event	865	(1)
Weathering Out	865	(1)
The Great Palaces of Versailles	866	(1)
ALBERTO RIOS (b. 1952)	867	(4)
Madre Sofia	868	(1)
A Dream of Husbands	869	(1)
A Man Then Suddenly Stops Moving	870	(1)
LOUISE ERDRICH (b. 1954)	871	(4)
Indian Boarding School: The Runaways	871	(1)
Francine's Room	872	(1)
That Pull from the Left	873	(1)
Windigo	874	(1)
CATHY SONG (b. 1955)	875	(7)
Leaving	876	(1)
Beauty and Sadness	877	(2)
Lost Sister	879	(1)
Heaven	880	(2)
MODERN POETRY IN ENGLISH: A BRIEF HISTORY	882	(15)
Bibliography	897	(26)
Index	923