by Joe Fiorito All I Have Learned is Where I Have Been, a poetry collection, contains quick snapshots of vivid moments. Fiorito expands his focus from those on the outskirts of society who were almost exclusively his subject matter in his previous work, City Poems, to include the more mundane aspects of life as well….
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by John Elizabeth Stintzi Junebat is a book of free verse poetry, with an underlying narrative and connected themes between pieces concerning the author’s struggles to understand their gender identity. It’s presented in the context of metamorphosis––their life before, the change, and afterward, with one poem directly comparing this with a caterpillar changing into a…
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by Marius Kociejowski I’m a fan of Kociejowski’s writing. And I tend to keep my eyes open for anything of his during my travels, though historically the exercise often has proved fruitless. Part of the issue, I feel, is that I always have associated him with his travel writing, which seems to have little in…
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Here’s something I haven’t done for a while: a guest blog post! In it, I discuss a deeper, technical aspect of writing poetry that can help bring the music out.
translated by Coleman Barks Jelaluddin Rumi was a sufi mystic who lived in Persia and Anatolia in the thirteenth century. I’ve read not only that his works have been hugely influential on Middle Eastern literature, but also that translations of these poems remain extremely popular in the West––as I feel they should be after experiencing…
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by Kayla Czaga Dunk Tank is a collection of poetry of the sort I quite enjoy, in form, specifically. Though Czaga writes free verse, she maintains a structure through the repetition of similar sounds rather than tight rhymes, and this is used to great effect within her work in at least a few ways, all…
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by Tomaž Šalamun I think studiousness is really threatening to overcome most, if not all, aspects of my life. It’s probably at least partially because I’ve enjoyed taking steps to not feel in over my head at all times, but I’m learning more and more that it’s not at all common. I bring this up…
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by Robert Frost Some poetry collections feel well ahead of their time when you’re in the midst of them. I remember being hit with this in the middle of Ezra Pound’s Cathay––that the author created something unique by moving away from rigidity within the poems but still maintaining a cohesive flow that came with inserting…
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Rubáiyát are tetrastichs, independent stanzas, each composed of four lines of near equal length. In their traditional form, all except the third line rhymes, though, occasionally, all lines of the verse rhyme. Omar Khayyám’s rubáiyát are probably the most famous poems written in the form, though they were obscure in the Western world until Edward…
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by Pablo Neruda I don’t know if I can stress enough the importance I find comes with reading a book of poetry through twice, back-to-back. I haven’t necessarily done it with every poetry collection I’ve read––not the longer ones, specifically––but my opinion feels so much more well informed at the end of such an exercise….
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