poetry
Poems in honor of a Benedictine life
Philip Kolin's longtime spiritual director was a chain-smoking oblate who fed everyone.
by Paul Mariani
Happy birthday, dear Gwendolyn
Miss Brooks would be 100 years old today. Her poetic-prophetic vision is worth celebrating.
Poems of witness
Molly McCully Brown recovers the lives of women at an institution notorious for its eugenics program.
by Anya Silver
Mary Magdalene is every woman
Marie Howe’s poems present Magdalene in many forms, contemporary and ancient.
by Amy Frykholm
Mother's Day picks
Looking for a gift for a mother in your life? Here are some possibilities.
I need poetry more than ever
These are not poetic times. We live and breathe prose.
Why we need Mary Oliver’s poems
When arguments fail us, we turn to words of wonder.
The isolation of Wallace Stevens
A new biography reveals the poet’s devotion to his vocation. It also reveals his loneliness.
Inventing a voice for Louis Till
John Edgar Wideman counters the official record of Emmett Till’s father with a more empathetic version.
by Amy Frykholm
Can the world be saved by poetry?
I was skeptical. Then I heard a poet read one of his poems.
How Paterson sidesteps the clichés embraced by La La Land
Escapism can be delightful. But artistic creation also uses the fodder of daily life.
Elegies without consolation
An anthology of poetry mourning the demise of the Church of England
Millay the poet, Millay the woman
Readers won't easily trace Edna St. Vincent Millay's personal life in this collection.
Poetry that bids us welcome
How is it that the poems of a 17th-century aristocrat still resonate with us?
Politics into poetry
Need a book to replenish your political and spiritual imagination this election season? I recommend Adrienne Rich's Collected Poems.
A garden of gratitude: Poet Ross Gay
"I've learned a lot from working with trees. More important, I've worked with people on imagining how to love each other."
interview by Amy Frykholm