Über die Autorinnen und Autoren

Joseph Parisi edited Poetry magazine from 1983 to 2003. He has been a Guggenheim Fellow and is a By-Fellow of Churchill College, Cambridge. His most recent books include Dear Editor: A History of Poetry in Letters and The Poetry Anthology, both co-edited with Stephen Young. Mr. Parisi lives in Chicago.

Joseph Parisi edited Poetry magazine from 1983 to 2003. He has been a Guggenheim Fellow and is a By-Fellow of Churchill College, Cambridge. His most recent books include Dear Editor: A History of Poetry in Letters and The Poetry Anthology, both co-edited with Stephen Young. Mr. Parisi lives in Chicago.

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100 ESSENTIAL MODERN POEMS

IVAN R. DEE

Contents

Acknowledgments..........................................viiIntroduction.............................................3WILLIAM BUTLER YEATS (1865-1939).........................9EDWIN ARLINGTON ROBINSON (1869-1935).....................16ROBERT FROST (1874-1963).................................18CARL SANDBURG (1878-1967)................................24WALLACE STEVENS (1879-1955)..............................26WILLIAM CARLOS WILLIAMS (1883-1963)......................34EZRA POUND (1885-1972)...................................39H.D. [HILDA DOOLITTLE] (1886-1961).......................46ROBINSON JEFFERS (1887-1962).............................48MARIANNE MOORE (1887-1972)...............................51T. S. ELIOT (1888-1965)..................................54RUPERT BROOKE (1887-1915)................................64SIEGFRIED SASSOON (1886-1967)............................65ISAAC ROSENBERG (1890-1918)..............................68WILFRED OWEN (1893-1918).................................70EDNA ST. VINCENT MILLAY (1892-1950)......................72DOROTHY PARKER (1893-1967)...............................74E. E. CUMMINGS (1894-1962)...............................75ROBERT GRAVES (1895-1985)................................78HART CRANE (1899-1932)...................................80LANGSTON HUGHES (1902-1967)..............................83OGDEN NASH (1902-1971)...................................86STEVIE SMITH (1902-1971).................................88PATRICK KAVANAGH (1904-1967).............................90ROBERT PENN WARREN (1905-1989)...........................94W. H. AUDEN (1907-1973)..................................97LOUIS MACNEICE (1907-1963)...............................102THEODORE ROETHKE (1908-1963).............................105ELIZABETH BISHOP (1911-1979).............................107KARL SHAPIRO (1913-2000).................................111JOHN BERRYMAN (1914-1972)................................114RANDALL JARRELL (1914-1965)..............................119DYLAN THOMAS (1914-1953).................................121WILLIAM STAFFORD (1914-1993).............................125GWENDOLYN BROOKS (1917-2000).............................127ROBERT LOWELL (1917-1977)................................128WILLIAM MEREDITH (b. 1919)...............................133HOWARD NEMEROV (1920-1991)...............................134RICHARD WILBUR (b. 1921).................................136PHILIP LARKIN (1922-1985)................................139JAMES DICKEY (1923-1997).................................144ANTHONY HECHT (1923-2004)................................147DENISE LEVERTOV (1923-1997)..............................149DONALD JUSTICE (1925-2004)...............................152KENNETH KOCH (1925-2002).................................154A. R. AMMONS (1926-2001).................................156DAVID WAGONER (b. 1926)..................................159ALLEN GINSBERG (1926-1997)...............................161JAMES MERRILL (1926-1995)................................172FRANK O'HARA (1926-1966).................................178W. D. SNODGRASS (b. 1926)................................181JOHN ASHBERY (b. 1927)...................................184GALWAY KINNELL (b. 1927).................................188W. S. MERWIN (b. 1927)...................................190JAMES WRIGHT (1927-1980).................................194PHILIP LEVINE (b. 1928)..................................196ANNE SEXTON (1928-1974)..................................199THOM GUNN (1929-2004)....................................202ADRIENNE RICH (b. 1929)..................................205TED HUGHES (1930-1998)...................................208DEREK WALCOTT (b. 1930)..................................213GEOFFREY HILL (b. 1932)..................................216SYLVIA PLATH (1932-1963).................................219LINDA PASTAN (b. 1932)...................................224MARK STRAND (b. 1934)....................................226CHARLES WRIGHT (b. 1935).................................228MARY OLIVER (b. 1935)....................................234C. K. WILLIAMS (b. 1936).................................237CHARLES SIMIC (b. 1938)..................................239SEAMUS HEANEY (b. 1939)..................................242STEPHEN DUNN (b. 1939)...................................250BILLY COLLINS (b. 1941)..................................252WILLIAM MATTHEWS (1942-1997).............................255SHARON OLDS (b. 1942)....................................259EAVAN BOLAND (b. 1944)...................................261KAY RYAN (b. 1945).......................................263YUSEF KOMUNYAKAA (b. 1947)...............................266JANE KENYON (1947-1995)..................................268PAUL MULDOON (b. 1951)...................................273RITA DOVE (b. 1952)......................................275Notes to the Poems.......................................281Credits..................................................296Index of Authors and Titles..............................300Index of Titles..........................................303

Chapter One

Looking over the large crowd at the first meeting of the Rhymers' Club in 1890, William Butler Yeats dryly observed, "The one thing certain is that we are too many." While he included himself in their number, all the assembled knew he was first among them. So he remained the rest of his life, and after, as one of the most acclaimed literary figures in the last hundred years and certainly the best known of Irish poets. Playwright and man of the theater, folklorist, scholar, adept in many a mysterious realm as well, Yeats had a gift for making music out of ordinary speech and an uncanny knack for finding striking metaphors and coining memorable phrases.

Decades before he became a senator in the newly independent Irish nation, the poet saw himself as a leader, indeed a symbol of his country, a bard in the grand tradition, equipped with special knowledge needed for his times. Perceiving the growing fragmentation of civilization, he had an apocalyptic vision and believed that poetry could provide "a last defense against the chaos of the world." Thus he developed a system of thought and personal symbols, attempting to organize his knowledge into an integrated whole. Few poets have been so ambitious or have made such extensive preparations for their vocation as Yeats, whose studies ran the gamut in literature, philosophy, and beyond, from myth and legend to arcane wisdom and esoteric lore.

Yeats's life was almost equally divided between the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, and his prolific work likewise falls into two major phases. Up to the early 1900s he was influenced by the English Romantic poetry of a century earlier and by his studies of the prophetic and mystical poetry of William Blake, French Symbolism, the occult, and the dreamy world of what he called "The Celtic Twilight," with its idealized view of Irish history and spirituality. Yeats became an expert on Irish folktales; steeped in the Irish past, he was not much concerned with modern-day life. But as he worked to establish an Irish theater and became more involved in politics, his subjects and style changed to accommodate the practical realities of contemporary society. Then he met a brash young American expatriate, Ezra Pound. Already world famous and twenty years his senior, Yeats submitted to Pound's tutelage and allowed himself to be "modernized" into...