While reading Anne Sexton’s third book of poetry, I also began reading a biography by Diane Wood Middlebrook. I enjoyed that syn64th book read in 2025
While reading Anne Sexton’s third book of poetry, I also began reading a biography by Diane Wood Middlebrook. I enjoyed that synergy because I learned about how she came to be a poet, how her poetry is autobiographical, how she used her creativity to combat her mental health issues.
In Live or Die, she is debating with herself (and her therapists) whether she will ever be well, whether to keep trying, but also realizing that her poetry will save her when nothing else can. Some of these poems are micro-short stories. Some are flights of fancy, some are bursts of defiant life. I feel her writing skills in this collection have reached a new level of competence and impact.
I was struck by how life for women in mid-20th century America could constrain their creativity, punish them for not being fully functional mothers while requiring them to have children. Psychiatry was still heavily Freudian.
Also, as always, there are the critics, the marketers, etc. She was heralded as one of the first female confessional poets. She was also maligned for it. In truth, along with Sylvia Plath, I feel she broke ground for so many female writers in all genres. She won the Pulitzer Prize for poetry for this 1966 cri di coeur! ...more
The poems in this collection deal with languages (lost and found), shifting borders due to wars, and the effects of displacement47th book read in 2025
The poems in this collection deal with languages (lost and found), shifting borders due to wars, and the effects of displacement on the author who lived through it. Sometimes you don’t need to move an inch to find yourself in a different country.
The border is between Austria and Slovenia. If you look it up on a map and if you know a little European history, you see that the area is one of those historical “hot spots” where military and economic conflict was nearly continuous for centuries.
I have no credentials for reviewing poetry except that I have been reading it daily for several years now. For me it takes several readings of a poem before I can glean what it might be about. I think it is good for my own writing to be doing this practice.
I was quite impressed by Maja Haderlap’s talent and skill as she brought this very foreign place alive for me while also reminding me how language is a deep and powerful emotional part of any human being’s makeup. ...more
I read this with my Tiny Book Club. One member is a poet and she chose this poetry collection for us. We are a group of three women, all are feministsI read this with my Tiny Book Club. One member is a poet and she chose this poetry collection for us. We are a group of three women, all are feminists, all are writers, two are Jewish, one is lapsed Christian turned Taoist, one is a lesbian. When we read poetry, we take turns reading some of the poems aloud.
Adrienne Rich was a feminist, born in 1929, died in 2012. She is considered one of the most widely read poets in the second half of the 20th century. She deals with the oppression of women and lesbians. I had not read her before.
I enjoyed her almost conversational style and her frequent referrals to women poets and writers from the past. I found I could grasp most of the poems in just one reading. I got a strong sense of strength in her thinking and writing.
In our discussion we recalled our early days of becoming feminists. It was invigorating. ...more
This was Anne Sexton’s second collection of poetry, published in 1962. It contains 31 poems. As I usually do when reading poetry, I took one poem a weThis was Anne Sexton’s second collection of poetry, published in 1962. It contains 31 poems. As I usually do when reading poetry, I took one poem a week, read it for seven days. Each time I would enter the poem like a first time in a foreign land. Each subsequent day its meaning would open up to me and become clear.
These poems cover the deaths of both her parents, remembrances from childhood, an operation, an abortion, thoughts on religion, her husband, and her first daughter. Grief, loss, pain, but also some humor and some defiance.
Anne Sexton suffered from bipolar disorder, which in the 1960s was called manic/depression. She was in and out of treatment, she attempted suicide, yet she produced much work in poetry, gave readings, published books, and won a Pulitzer Prize. In the end, she lost her battle with her illness but my reading has not taken me to that point yet. She died in 1973.
I have recently read several memoirs by young women who suffered from the same mental disorder. They in various ways were able to stabilize and live with the affliction, to create art, thanks to medication and therapy. Mental health treatments have come a long way in 60 years.
I wonder what more Anne Sexton might have created. ...more
Once again my subscription to Archipelago Books has given me a wondrous reading experience. This is a poetry collection assembled and translated into Once again my subscription to Archipelago Books has given me a wondrous reading experience. This is a poetry collection assembled and translated into English by the poet’s daughter. Nabaneeta Dev Sen was a Bengali woman, highly educated in India and the United States, who wrote poetry, as well as in many other genres, who taught, and who was a feminist in her life from 1938-2019. She was the daughter of two poets and was named by Rabindranath Tagore!
My usual practice when reading poetry is to take a poem and read it every day for a week. This works to bring the poem’s meaning and structure into a clear understanding in my mind. Since the poems here are usually quite short, I would take three or four poems for the week’s reading. I was rewarded with a connection to this woman from a land so far away who seemed to understand women in general and me in particular.
The poems are arranged not by the dates they were written but into named categories: The Unseen Pendulum, I Cage Language, Sapling of a Heart, Do I Know This Face, and Sacred Face. Since these poems were written between 1957 and 2019, yet collected into the categories, I felt I got a look at how the poet returned to various ideas again and again in her poems.
Truly wondrous! Truly a work of love and devotion by the daughter. ...more
Helena Lipstadt is a friend. I met her through another reading friend in 2014. That other reading friend and I had formed a reading group of two (callHelena Lipstadt is a friend. I met her through another reading friend in 2014. That other reading friend and I had formed a reading group of two (called The World’s Smallest Reading Group) so we could choose and read more challenging books than our current group was selecting. That other friend brough Helena in. No longer being The World’s Smallest, we changed our name to The Tiny Book Club.
When I first met Helena I was a bit intimidated. I knew she wrote poetry and she seemed thoughtful, a bit reserved, but also a close listener. I have come to value her and her insights. It was not until 2019 that she suggested we add poetry to our selections. She introduced us to Marina Tzvetaeva, Natalie Diaz, Jo Harjo and Ilya Kaminsky. Finally at one meeting she read one of her poems to us!
She told us she had assembled a collection of her poems and was submitting it to publishers. Our Dark and Radiant Land is that collection. After years of toil and practice and having single poems published here and there, she now has a debut collection.
What a wonder this book is. Helena’s poems are composed of compelling emotions, trauma and intensity. She was conceived in postwar Warsaw, Poland by Jewish parents. Still in her mother’s womb she participated in a harrowing escape to Berlin, Germany and as a young child she was brought by her parents to America. Her father’s strongest command was that she NEVER return to Poland.
However, after her parents’ deaths she decided to go. She wanted to find the land of her people and she wanted to find out if it were possible for some reconciliation in Poland between Christians and Jews. Our Dark and Radiant Land is the result of that quest.
The poems are interspersed with personal essays. Even in prose she is poetic! The effect of this collection on me was enormous. Though I have been a regular reader of poetry since meeting Helena, only some of the poems I have read have had such an effect on me.
I have always had Jewish friends, ever since childhood. I was drawn to them and yet felt some barriers between us. At least for me, Our Dark and Radiant Land has broken down barriers and brought about a reconciliation between my lapsed Christian self and the fraught world of the Jews. ...more
I had heard of Claudia Rankine. She is a prolific Black poet, author and professor. Now I have finally read one of her books.
Citizen is a book one neeI had heard of Claudia Rankine. She is a prolific Black poet, author and professor. Now I have finally read one of her books.
Citizen is a book one needs to take a brief introductory tour through before beginning to read. It is a hybrid of words and pictures composed of essays written in lyrical prose: a kind of hybrid writing. Each piece is followed by photos and works of art by other Black Americans.
Another quirk I had to parse is that she writes mainly in the second person, though sometimes she is talking to herself, sometimes to others, sometimes to the reader.
The entire book is showing and telling the reader (or commiserating with a Black reader) what it is like to move through American life as a Black person. She makes that so clear that I began to feel a sympathetic PTSD. I could only read a short section each day and then ponder it. The impact is visceral.
I came to Citizen thanks to a San Francisco based on-line magazine called Alta. It has its own book club, the California Book Club, that features books either written by California authors or set in the state. Once a month the author is interviewed (virtually) by the incredibly astute reader and book critic, John Freeman along with a special guest.
My next to last book finished in 2022 is the first poetry collection by Anne Sexton. I became interested in this poet after hearing a talk with LaurenMy next to last book finished in 2022 is the first poetry collection by Anne Sexton. I became interested in this poet after hearing a talk with Lauren Groff, who said she reads Sexton's poetry before starting her writing for the day.
I did something different this time as far as reading poetry goes. I used to read a poem a day but often felt I had not really grasped each poem. So instead, I read one poem a week, once everyday. It was amazing how much more deeply I got into every poem's meanings, language, rhythms, etc.
I did indeed fall in love with Anne Sexton, with her honesty and openness about herself. These poems demanded that I look more curiously at my self, other women in my life, in literature and in the creative arts.
Anne had as many troubles as Marilyn Monroe, the creative woman I read about in the book before this one. They were of the same generation, born in the late 1920s and coming of age in the 1940s, achieving recognition in the 1950s. Both of them died young, though Anne lived for 46 years, Marilyn only 36. It would be another 20 years before feminism became widely influential in women's lives as to our place in life and society. But Anne was one who began fomenting the questions.
To Bedlam and Part Way Back contains 33 poems, written during her first breakdown and time spent in a mental institution. I began reading it in May, 2022. Thus I'd been with Anne Sexton everyday for over half the year. I am moving on to another poet but I will come back to the rest of the volumes in The Complete Poems of Anne Sexton soon....more
I read this for a reading group. Just reading it was a project that took a month and a half. The book is an expansion of a New York Times Magazine speI read this for a reading group. Just reading it was a project that took a month and a half. The book is an expansion of a New York Times Magazine special issue created by Nikole Hannah-Smith and published on August 18, 2019 to mark the 400th anniversary of the first enslaved Africans brought to Jamestown, VA: August 18, 1619.
Subtitled A New Origin Story, the book traces slavery and Black history in America. It is composed of 19 essays by eminent historians and journalists, 36 poems and short works of fiction interspersed between the essays, and photos. Altogether these elements show how slavery in America was a fatal flaw in the founding of the country, its growth, and our enduring gnarly problem of racism.
The essays trace the ways slavery has been integral to American history from 19 different viewpoints. I took it at approximately a chapter a day. The knowledge presented grew in my understanding like a crazy quilt. The cumulative effect on me was a combined sense of how wealth, politics, ignorance and downright evil have woven an almost inextricable pattern of abuse, lies, denial and discrimination that influences the lives of Black people to this day.
Along with all that heavy and shameful information came an appreciation of how much these people have contributed to America and how tenacious they have been in insisting on the rights granted in our constitution.
By the time I reached the end, I felt it was one of the most educational books I have ever read. Of course, it has been banned in certain school districts, challenged in every possible way, yet I obtained it easily from my library and it is for sale everywhere....more
It is always a challenge for me to review poetry collections as I am a neophyte in the genre.
I read Deaf Republic for my highly conscious reading grouIt is always a challenge for me to review poetry collections as I am a neophyte in the genre.
I read Deaf Republic for my highly conscious reading group The Tiny Book Club. We also plan to read a short story collection set in Ukraine.
Ilya Kaminsky, born in Ukraine but now an American citizen, is a favorite of one of our three group members, who is herself a poet.
Deaf Republic is a connected series of poems about a time of political unrest in an unnamed occupied territory. The oppressed people, after a young deaf boy is killed by one of the soldiers, represent themselves as deaf, create their own sign language, engage in subversive acts, and suffer much loss.
I had not read a collection of poems that tell a story before and was amazed by how much story Kaminsky created and related through poems. He brought the spirit of resistance down to the day to day lives of desperate people in a wondrous use of words that put me into their bodies and hearts and minds....more
I have been reading these poems by Native American Poet Laureate Joy Harjo over the past month. The collection is a perfect companion to her memoir, PI have been reading these poems by Native American Poet Laureate Joy Harjo over the past month. The collection is a perfect companion to her memoir, Poet Warrior.
I am a mere beginner when it comes to reading poetry. I began reading a poem a day in 2016 with Mary Oliver's A Thousand Mornings. I have learned that just as there are many ways to tell a story in fiction, there are many ways to write a poem. With some poems I can get pretty close to what they are about. Others confound me. I usually read poems aloud because I feel I connect better that way.
Joy Harjo's poems just went right to my heart and mind. Having read her memoir I already had the background on her life and the lives of her family and ancestors, the sad and shameful tale of the Trail of Tears, when her Muscogee ancestors were forcibly removed from their lands in Arkansas and marched to barren lands in Oklahoma, the struggles of her people to find their places in American life.
The poems, some of which are prose poems, some free verse, some influenced by Native American songs and rites, sing with truth and even hope. Not just hope for Native Americans but also for all of us that we can reconnect to the land and plants and creatures. Though all peoples of the world carry violence and war in our make up, Joy is essentially a pacifist. Thus she speaks to her own people but to all of us with her plea for living in harmony with our environment and each other.
She reminds me that it is both possible and essential that such ideas be entered into human consciousness by way of words and music and action....more
I have been reading these poems over the past month. They were written while the author was a soldier for Italy during WWI, though not collected and pI have been reading these poems over the past month. They were written while the author was a soldier for Italy during WWI, though not collected and published until 1969. He wrote them on scraps of whatever was at hand in the trenches.
What I loved about the poems is how much he says in so few words. How he observes what is around him and what is going on inside his mind.
And I think, if one can write under such circumstances and somehow preserve the pages, what excuse do I have?...more
This was my first foray into the poetry of Nikki Giovanni. In my usual way, I read a poem a day over several weeks. She self-published this first collThis was my first foray into the poetry of Nikki Giovanni. In my usual way, I read a poem a day over several weeks. She self-published this first collection and it immediately put her in the forefront of Black poets and writers. She is at once light-hearted, funny, dead serious and in your face. Do you want to know what it is like for a young black woman coming of age in the 1950s and 1960s? Read these poems!...more
I received this poetry collection as the June selection of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. I had not known about Natalie Diaz previously. I followed I received this poetry collection as the June selection of The Nervous Breakdown Book Club. I had not known about Natalie Diaz previously. I followed my usual practice of reading a poem each night before bed.
The poet is Native American, born and raised in the Fort Mojave Indian Village on the edge of Needles, CA. In other words, on the reservation, which sits on the banks of the Colorado River. She is a member of the Gila River Indian Tribe. She teaches and holds the Chair in Modern Contemporary Poetry at Arizona State University. Her book has been shortlisted for the National Book Award for Poetry. This is a woman who gets things done!
The poems cover Native American issues, legends, relationships with land and air and water and animals. They also reveal the depth of Natalie's passion for her partner--sensual, sexy, hot! Survival, oppression, freedom, philosophy, love and humor are her subject matter. ("Top Ten Reasons Why Indians Are Good At Basketball" is an example of some of her humor.)
I humbly admit, in many of the poems I could only guess at the meanings of some of her words and lines. However I was never in doubt about her intensity, her passion. After I came to the end of the poems, I discovered she had written notes for some of the poems. So now I need to go back and read those again.
I also listened to her interview on the Otherppl podcast where I learned much about her life so far. You can listen to Natalie reading some of her poems on YouTube....more
Strong, raw, slightly mad poetry. Her imagery of Los Angeles and surrounding areas is brilliant. Her suffering is right in your face. I don't ever knoStrong, raw, slightly mad poetry. Her imagery of Los Angeles and surrounding areas is brilliant. Her suffering is right in your face. I don't ever know how to give stars to poetry because I am no expert but for sheer impact, for her ability to make me feel, I had to give this one 4 stars....more
I finished this collection of selected poems by Gwendolyn Brooks. I have got the habit now of reading a poem a day, usually before bed. Even more tha I finished this collection of selected poems by Gwendolyn Brooks. I have got the habit now of reading a poem a day, usually before bed. Even more than fiction, a poem takes me out of my own head and into the poet's.
Ms Brooks was a phenom when it came to publishing books of poetry: 19 of them. She won a Pulitzer Prize in 1950, the first Black author to do so. "I am interested in telling my particular truth as I have seen it," she wrote. Her truth comes from her life as a Black woman in America.
She only wrote one novel, Maud Martha, 1953. I liked it so much that for years I was upset she didn't write more novels. I am no longer upset. Her poems are just as good. I hope one day to read all of those 19 books.
So far in my poetry adventure I have read 20th century poets. Now I am ready for the earlier works, the foundations of modern poetry. I have dug out The Standard Book of British and American Verse from my shelves. It begins with Chaucer (1340-1400) and ends with Vita Sackville West (1892-1962). On the advice of Christopher Morley, who wrote the preface, I am reading it back to front, "so that you begin with the contemporary mood and gradually swim towards older words and manners," as he says. It is a huge book, 735 pages. It may take me the rest of my life to read! I feel fine, after Gwendolyn Brooks's rendering of her American experience, about swimming towards earlier beginnings. It is part of what we do as we age....more
This was the third translated book I read in March. The others were The Years and The Ravishing of Lol Stein. I came upon all three by different rout This was the third translated book I read in March. The others were The Years and The Ravishing of Lol Stein. I came upon all three by different routes and none were on the list of my self created challenge to read one translated book a month. It appears I have opened a door in my reading life and a flood is coming through. How exciting.
Dark Elderberry Branch is a book of poetry that also includes an afterword about the poet's life by one of the translators. It was the March selection of my Tiny Book Club, suggested by the member who is a poet. We are having a Russian moment, having read Keith Gessen's A Terrible Country prior to this.
The poems in this collection got under my skin, delighted me, and gave me chills. I fell in love with Marina Tsvetaeva as have many others. The book comes with a CD of the poems being read in Russian. Though I do not speak or read Russian, hearing these poems in their original language while reading them in English was completely surreal.
Tsvetaeva (1892-1941) grew up in the last years of Tsarist Russia, lived through the Revolution of 1917 and the early years of the USSR. Those years are also covered in an amazing novel I read about a year and a half ago: The Revolution of Marina M by Janet Fitch. Early in the story the heroine, also named Marina, is about to turn 16 and plans to be a poet. It was in this book that I first read the names of Marina Tsvetaeva and her compatriot Anna Akhmatova. Marina M would to out to the coffeehouses to catch a glimpse of them and hopefully hear their poems. The two wrote poems for each other.
I finished reading another poetry collection on the Read One Poem a Day plan. It was the first poetry I have read by Sylvia Plath.
I am no expert on I finished reading another poetry collection on the Read One Poem a Day plan. It was the first poetry I have read by Sylvia Plath.
I am no expert on poetry. Except for short bits in my school days I have never studied the genre. I have not wanted to learn about the techniques, the rules, the forms; I have not wanted to dissect poetry too much but rather to simply experience the poems.
Reading Ariel gave me pause though. In many of these poems I could only guess at what she was expressing. The imagery is so sharp it almost caused me pain, physical and mental, yet I could not exactly grasp what she was saying in many of them despite reading them again and again.
Knowing this was her last batch prior to taking her own life, successfully after several attempts, may have colored my reactions. I felt she was in deep psychic pain but was also in a deeper love with life and the world.
After finishing the book I read somewhere that her husband, Ted Hughes, edited the poems for publication. Knowing only the speculations and rumors that he was somehow responsible for her death, I was shocked! Was this another F Scott Fitzgerald and Zelda story?
One of the best things about reading as much as I do is how I discover my deep pockets of ignorance. What do I actually know about either of these people? Not much. So I went looking. Now I have a list of biographies about Sylvia and collections of the poetry of both.
I see that I have yet another project. Oh my. In my research I got the sense of a strong creative bond between the two poets. I am the most interested in that and look forward to learning much more. Anyone who could write the poems in Ariel had to have been imbued with the level of creativity I admire in many artists....more
This book of poetry is by the author of the stupendous Weetzie Bat, my favorite YA novel ever! After I finished the WB Yeats collection in September, This book of poetry is by the author of the stupendous Weetzie Bat, my favorite YA novel ever! After I finished the WB Yeats collection in September, I went to my shelves and found only three books of poetry: an already read collection of Edna St Vincent Millay, The Standard Book of British and American Verse published in 1932, and a signed advance reader copy of these poems by Block. That night I opened How to (Un)cage a Girl and resumed my new poem-a-day practice.
There is no doubt that these poems come from the unique sensibility of Francesca Lia Block. Magical, emotional, probably auto-biographical. In three sections she does teenage years, young woman years, and more mature woman years.
The poems express the secret thoughts of women. While they are set in a world of adventurous, sometimes misbehaving females, I think that even the most proper, well-behaved women have these secret thoughts and feelings.
I just ordered Sylvia Plath's Ariel. Female poetry is what I need these days. Are you reading poetry? If yes, what?...more
I read an entire book of poetry! I have not read poetry since I was in 8th grade and fell in love with Edna St Vincent Mi A BIT OF MUSING ABOUT POETRY
I read an entire book of poetry! I have not read poetry since I was in 8th grade and fell in love with Edna St Vincent Millay: "Renascence" and "My Candle Burns At Both Ends" and so many more. I have read a little Millay over the years, especially after reading a biography for Young Adults in 1997, Edna St Vincent Millay, America's Best Loved Poet by Toby Shafter and Nancy Milford's very adult and very wonderful Savage Beauty in 2002.
For the past few years I have read the Tao Te Ching over and over, a chapter a day, and it helped me through many rough patches. But as 2016 dawned, I was feeling much more stable in my personal life and cast around for something else to pursue during what had come to be a daily devotional reading.
A blogger friend of mine does a poetry feature every Sunday and I began reading her posted poems. I found I could suddenly enjoy poetry again. Why not read a poem a day?
My daughter-in-law's sister had raved to me about Mary Oliver when she stayed with me a couple summers ago, so I started with A Thousand Mornings, found at my local library.
Her poems in this volume are mostly short observances of the natural world around her as it relates to her state of mind. There was not one poem I didn't like and many brought me either balm or a good kick in the pants, both needed because of the weird places my mind goes sometimes.
I will read her again. Since finishing this slim volume, I have turned to the Penguin Classics edition of W B Yeats Selected Poems, because spring always makes me want to go to Ireland. I'll be on this one for a while since the book contains over 200 poems. It's all good.
But I am open to recommendations about poets you have loved....more