American Life in Poetry #200: What My Father Left Behind by Chris Forhan
...surviving the loss of a parent...
American Life in Poetry #199: Inscrutable Twist by Anne Pierson Wiese
...a memoryscape...
American Life in Poetry #198: Self-Portrait by Zozan Hawez
...the first we've published by a young person who is also a political refugee.
American Life in Poetry #197: A Small Moment by Cornelius Eady
I suspect that one thing some people have against reading poems is that they are so often so serious, so devoid of joy, as if we poets spend all our time brooding about mutability and death and never having any fun.
American Life in Poetry #196: Gloves by Jose Angel Araguz
One of the most effective means for conveying strong emotion is to invest some real object with one's feelings,...
American Life in Poetry #195: Christmas Night by Conrad Hilberry
...no more than a little flare of light, an affirmation,...
American Life in Poetry #194: Applied Geometry by Russell Libby
...a way that makes it feel deep and magical.
American Life in Poetry #193: How Is It That the Snow by Robert Haight
The first two lines of this poem pose a question many of us may have thought about...
American Life in Poetry #192: Fences by Pat Mora
...contrasts the lives of rich tourists with the less fortunate people who serve them.
American Life in Poetry #191: Finding a Bible in an Abandoned Cabin by Robert Wrigley
...what's left of a Bible...
American Life in Poetry #190: Cutting Hair by Minnie Bruce Pratt
Occupational hazards, well, you have to find yourself in the occupation to know about those.
American Life in Poetry #189: On Swearing by Gary Dop
...standing at Normandy, remembering.
American Life in Poetry #188: Ghost Villanelle by Dan Lechay
The drifting veils of rhyme and meter disclose a ghost,...
American Life in Poetry #187: The Accompanist by Dick Allen
...the way he so easily draws us in...
American Life in Poetry #186: Daughter by James Lenfestey
...the beautiful mystery of a daughter.
American Life in Poetry #185: The Old Liberators by Robert Hedin
...and now all those have died...
American Life in Poetry #184: After Work by John Maloney
I hope it's not just a guy thing, a delight in the trappings of work.
American Life in Poetry #183: Gathering Leaves in Grade School by Judith Harris
But are our memories as richly detailed as these...
American Life in Poetry #182: The Crow by Kaelum Poulson
A middle school student and already accomplished maker of poems, he writes of the thankless toils of an unlikely but entirely necessary member of our community--the crow!
American Life in Poetry #181: Prayer for the Dead by Stuart Kestenbaum
...the author of this week's poem, lost his brother Howard in the destruction of the twin towers of the World Trade Center.
American Life in Poetry #180: My name came from. . . by Emmett Tenorio Melendez
...an eleven-year-old poet from San Antonio, Texas, proudly presents us with his name and its meaning.
American Life in Poetry #179: Bushwick: Latex Flat 2001 by D. Nurkse
I especially like the use of the verb, lap, in line seven, because that's exactly the sound a four-inch wall brush makes.
American Life in Poetry #178: Father, Child, Water by Gary Dop
We mammals are ferociously protective of our young,...
American Life in Poetry #177: Rain at the Zoo by Kristen Tracy
...so perfectly truthful and vivid?
American Life in Poetry #176: Sunflower by Frank Steele
Hearts and flowers, that's how some people dismiss poetry, suggesting that's all there is to it, just a bunch of sappy poets weeping over love and beauty.
American Life in Poetry #175: Driving to Camp Lend-A-Hand by Berwyn Moore
...fear--irrational, but exquisitely painful all the same.
American Life in Poetry #174: To Katharine: At Fourteen Months by Joelle Biele
Here's a lovely picture of a small child learning the laws of physics.
American Life in Poetry #173: Piano by Patrick Phillips
...a masterful job of comparing a wrecked piano to his feelings.
American Life in Poetry #172: Marry Me by Veronica Patterson
...senryu is a Japanese form similar to haiku but dealing with people rather than nature.
American Life in Poetry #171: Planting the Sand Cherry by Ann Struthers
Sometimes I think that people are at their happiest when they're...
American Life in Poetry #170: Night Dive by Sam Green
...some really deep, dark water.
American Life in Poetry #169: Heart by Rick Campbell
Seeing one's self as a skeleton, or receiving any kind of medical report, even when the news is good, can be unsettling.
American Life in Poetry #168: The Laughter of Women by Mary-Sherman Willis
So often, reading a poem can in itself feel like a thing overheard.
American Life in Poetry #167: For the Tattooed Man by Sharmila Voorakkara
Among young people, tattoos are all the rage and, someday,...
American Life in Poetry #166: Fried Beauty by R. S. Gwynn
...a picnic instead of a sermon.
American Life in Poetry #165: Seeing the Eclipse in Maine by Robert Bly
Notice how the experience happens to "we," the group,...
American Life in Poetry #164: Dead Butterfly by Ellen Bass
How often have you wondered what might be going on inside a child's head?
American Life in Poetry #163: Ode to Marbles by Max Mendelsohn
I have always enjoyed poems that celebrate the small pleasures of life.
American Life in Poetry #162: Summer Job by Richard Hoffman
Though at the time it may not occur to us to call it "mentoring,"...
American Life in Poetry #161: Car Showroom by Jonathan Holden
...a young car salesman, who is trying hard, perhaps too hard.
American Life in Poetry #160: Three Teenage Girls: 1956 by Steve Orlen
...the details not only help us to see the girls clearly, but the last detail...
American Life in Poetry #159: The Inevitable by Allan Peterson
...gets at the feelings of receiving bad news by letter...
American Life in Poetry #158: Part of a Legacy by Frank Steele
Putting bed pillows onto the grass to freshen, it's a pretty humble subject for a poem,...
American Life in Poetry #157: In Your Absence by Judith Harris
...you may remember A. E. Housman's poem that begins, "Loveliest of trees, the cherry now/ Is hung with bloom along the bough."
American Life in Poetry #156: Today's News by David Tucker
...deputy managing editor of the New Jersey "Star-Ledger" and has been a reporter and editor at the "Toronto Star" and the "Philadelphia Inquirer." He was on the "Star-Ledger" team that won the 2005 Pulitzer Prize for breaking news.
American Life in Poetry #155: Hospital by Marianne Boruch
...a space familiar to us all but made new...
American Life in Poetry #154: Yellowjackets by Yusef Komunyakaa
...a fine portrait of the hard life of a worker--in this case, a horse...
American Life in Poetry #153: Spare Parts by Trish Dugger
...Poet Laureate of the City of Encinitas, makes fine use of the one patched but good heart she has.
American Life in Poetry #152: Medical History by Carrie Shipers
...how she once wished for a dramatic rescue by screaming ambulance, only to find...
American Life in Poetry #151: Safe by Steven Huff
Thirty, forty years ago, there were lots of hitchhikers...
American Life in Poetry #150: What the Frost Casts Up by Ed Ochester
There's a world of great interest and significance right under our feet, but most of us don't think to look down.
American Life in Poetry #149: The Quarrel by Linda Pastan
Elsewhere in this newspaper you may find some advice for maintaining and repairing troubled relationships.
American Life in Poetry #148: Santa Paula by Lee McCarthy
The poet can steer us a little by the selection of details, but a lot of the effect of the poem is in what is not said, in what we deduce.
American Life in Poetry #147: [Untitled] by William Kloefkorn
...a late confession...
American Life in Poetry #146: Veterans of the Seventies by Marvin Bell
...a group of these emotionally damaged soldiers, gathered together for breakfast.
American Life in Poetry #145: Insomnia by Rynn Williams
...a suitable remedy.
American Life in Poetry #144: How Good Fortune Surprises Us by Jackson Wheeler
...we're happy that it didn't happen to us.
American Life in Poetry #143: In the House of the Voice of Maria Callas by Steve Orlen
...many of us listened to her on the radio or on our parents' record players...
American Life in Poetry #142: Elegance by Linda Gregg
...that old business about the tree falling in the middle of the forest...
American Life in Poetry #141: Trust by Thomas R. Smith
...some practical advice.
American Life in Poetry #140: Chanukah Lights Tonight by Steven Schneider
Isn't this a party to which you'd like to be invited?
American Life in Poetry #139: The Lady and the Tramp by Bruce Guernsey
...a domestic communion.
American Life in Poetry #138: At a Certain Age by Deborah Cummins
...in the best of all possible worlds, people who love their work should be able to do it as long as they wish.
American Life in Poetry #137: Superhero Pregnant Woman by Jessy Randall
...the senses can go haywire.
American Life in Poetry #136: Sleep by Todd Davis
...a fine seasonal poem...
American Life in Poetry #135: The Crossing by Ruth Moose
What motivates us to keep moving forward...
American Life in Poetry #134: Old Woman With Protea Flowers, Kahalui Airport by Kathleen Flenniken
Those were among our first stories, and we still venture into the world and return to tell others what happened.
American Life in Poetry #133: Afterwards by David Baker
By alone I mean that even among throngs of mourners we pull back within ourselves and peer out at life as if through a window.
American Life in Poetry #132: The Garden Buddha by Peter Pereira
Poets are good at discerning life within what otherwise might seem lifeless.
American Life in Poetry #131: A Dandelion for My Mother by Jean Nordhaus
...every experience, however commonplace, is unique to he or she who seizes it.
American Life in Poetry #130: Columbus Park by Anne Pierson Wiese
...winner of the Walt Whitman Award from the Academy of American Poets...
American Life in Poetry #129: Louisiana Line by Betty Adcock
Betty Adcock, has written scores of beautiful poems, almost all of them too long for this space.
American Life in Poetry #128: Snip Your Hair by Devon Regina DeSalva
...she wrote this poem to get back at her mother, only to find that her mother loved the poem.
American Life in Poetry #127: Nest by Marianne Boruch
It is the simplest of discoveries, yet she uses it to remind us that what at first seems ordinary,...
American Life in Poetry #126: The Raspberry Room by Karin Gottshall
...her own sort of private place.
American Life in Poetry #125: Subway by Barry Goldensohn
...a contemporary subway station.
American Life in Poetry #124: Matinee by Patrick Phillips
Here is a lovely poem about survival...
American Life in Poetry #123: Found Letter by Joshua Weiner
Such a poem might be words scrawled on a wadded scrap of paper, or buried in the classified ads, or on a billboard by the road.
American Life in Poetry #122: Hymn to the Comb-Over by Wesley McNair
...these valorous attempts to disguise hair loss.
American Life in Poetry #121: Wind by Mike White
A large white umbrella blown into the street, and an aproned waiter rushing to the rescue.
American Life in Poertry #120: Heaven, 1963 by Kim Noriega
The loss of youth and innocence...
American Life in Poetry #119: Banana Trees by Joseph Stanton
I'm a dedicated stay-at-home and much prefer to read something fascinating about a place than visit it myself.
American Life in Poetry #118: Alberto by Warren Woessner
And weather stories? We tell them in the same way our ancestors related encounters with fearsome dragons.
American Life in Poetry #117: Geometry by Nancy Botkin
...the parents downstairs in their stultifying dailiness, the children enjoying their youth under the eaves...
American Life in Poetry #116: Safari, Rift Valley by Roy Jacobstein
...experience on a safari to the place believed by archaeologists to be the original site of human life.
American Life in Poetry #115: Visitation by Jeffrey Harrison
...bittersweet poem...
American Life in Poetry #114: Echo by Robert West
...successful poems not only make use of the meanings and sounds of words, as well as the images those words conjure up, but may also take advantage of the arrangement of type on a page.
American Life in Poetry #113: Swimming With A Hundred Year Old Snapping Turtle by Freya Manfred
...most of the world's species look upon us with justifiable wariness, for we're among the most dangerous critters on the planet.
American Life in Poetry #112: Slow Dancing on the Highway: the Trip North by Elizabeth Hobbs
Not only do we have road rage, but it seems we have road love, too.
American Life in Poetry #111: Drought by Felecia Caton Garcia
...there are times when parents feel helpless and hopeless. But the human heart is remarkable and, like a dry creek bed, somehow fills again, is renewed and restored.
American Life in Poetry #110: Summer Downpour on Campus by Juliana Gray
Here's the celebration of a moment on a campus somewhere, anywhere.
American Life in Poetry #109: Wallpapering by Sue Ellen Thompson
One big test of the endurance of any relationship is taking on a joint improvement project.
American Life in Poetry #108: Houdini by Kay Ryan
American Life in Poetry #107: Supple Cord by Naomi Shihab Nye
...a lovely moment from her childhood.
American Life in Poetry #106: Catching the Moles by Judith Kitchen
...an experience that resonates beyond the simple details...
American Life in Poetry #105: Laundry by Ruth Moose
...poetry can hold a mirror up to life, and I'm especially fond of poems that hold those mirrors up to our most ordinary activities, showing them at their best and brightest.
American Life in Poetry #104: Where They Lived by Marge Saiser
...a house where aged parents lived out their days.
American Life in Poetry #103: How Are You Doing? by Rick Snyder
It's not just baseball caps, it's Tasmanian Devil caps; it's not just music on the intercom, it's James Taylor.
American Life in Poetry #102: Morel Mushrooms by Jane Whitledge
The morel is among nature's most elusive species.
American Life in Poetry #101: Wax Lips by Cynthia Rylant
Those big cherry flavored wax lips that my friends and I used to buy when I was a boy, well, how could I resist this poem...
