The Best American Poetry 1997

"...poetry speaks against an essential backdrop of silence. It is almost reluctant to speak at all, knowing that it can never fully name what is at the heart of its intentions. There is a prayerful, haunted silence between words, between phrases, between images, ideas and lines." ~ pg. 19 Used books hold within their pages additional mysteries and this one was no exception. Also, when the first poem in a book makes you cry, it is almost guaranteed you will be finding additional poems to love. "That Cold Summer" by Nin Andrews is so startling in imaginative beauty and many of the poems seem to flow together with a similar idea. "Often as children, my friend and I used to pretend we had wings. Attaching towels to our backs with safety pins, we'd leap from sofas and chairs, thudding ungracefully on the floor ...But what is it these angels represent to us if no the ability to lift off the planet, to escape the pull of gravity? And this, I think, is one of the reasons I write." ~ Nin Andrews The Butterfly Effect by Harry Humes presents ideas to ponder as does Karen Volkman's "Infernal" where she writes: "The revenant sprawls by the pool assessing opulent stucco and glossy indigo." I love the way the poem ends: "I stay close to the water, you stay close to the shore." I thought it was rather intriguing that when I had just read The Best American Poetry book edited by A.R. Ammons, that I should open this book and find a "Worldwide Travel Specialist's" business card right at his poem: "From Strip." While I wouldn't mind a vacation to New Zealand, I do find many of the poetry books by David Lehman to be journeys into many minds and enjoyable escapes into poetry. "she was, like a piece of the sky looking at herself. She watched him like a deer caught in the headlights, staring until he touched her shoulder, and he shuddered. Colder than snow, she was. Donald said that's why he invited her in to warm herself. She had a long wind inside her than fanned the flames a brilliant blue." ~ from Nin Andrew's "That Cold Summer" ~The Rebecca Review

Leave it to James Tate. The poems in this collection are witty, profound, whimsical, and memorable. There isn't one I wouldn't finish reading if I came across it in its original source.Unlike some of the unpolished PC rants in Rich's collection, these are poems that truly matter because they reflect on what Faulkner called "the verities of the human heart." Unlike some of the fatally over-ambitious poems in Hollander's collection, these poems are less than epic length but more than haiku -- just right.I'm mostly a library reader, but this is the one I might actually buy.

I have been reading this series since 1993 and I feel that this is one of the strongest ones in the series. Some good choices from the better known poets, and wonderful poems by poets I was unfamiliar with, including Thomas Sayers Ellis (whose "Atomic Bride" is sure to become a classic). Though the book may drift a little towards the middle in terms of taste, Tate does a good job of mixing different aesthetics into this volume. Also, I think Tate's introduction is the most memorable I've read from the series.

This anthology represents the current standard aspiring writers must live up to. I look to this collection for a vivisection of the poetry "mood" prevelant in the past year. It is encouraging to find such a diversity of writers between the covers of one book. I especially applaud the inclusion of "new" writers such as Bob Hicok. He has been a local favorite in southeastern Michigan for the past couple of years, and I am delighted to see him receiving national attention. I highly recommend this volume of poetry.