Discover The New American Poetry, 1945-1960 Designed By Donald M. Allen Presented As Hardbound
mix of wellknown and lesser known poets, this collection harbors some rare treasures from its time period.
Only read the work by Charles Olson, A good overview of midcentury American poetry, Just flipped through this the other day for the first time in a few years, and I'd forgotten how great it is.
It's a great anthology for finding out what was going on in American poetry immediately after the War, and it spans a short enough periodyears to be very comprehensive and, with a few exceptions, gives a good amount of print space to poets who otherwise wouldn't have had any in print.
A beautiful book, and a must own for poetry lovers, This was the book that introduced me to contemporary American poetry at least the poetry that was outside of academia at that time in the's.
Many of the poets have since passed, but I still read the works of some of them Sorrentino, Dorn, Blackburn, Creeley, J.
Williams today. For me it's a book that's still alive, For me, this is where my reading amp writing of poetry began, It's not just the poets represented here Olson, Blackburn, Creeley, Duncan, Spicer, etc, but the poems selected, which, frankly, seems to be a lost art, There have been numerous anthologies published since, some with even more impressive lineups, but they lack the selectivity of works that this anthology epitomized.
The poems selected for Olson really highlight what was revolutionary in his thought The Kingfishers, The Lordly amp Isolate Satyrs, The Distances.
All three great poems, all three truly projective, and all three poems so compelling that I still reread them to this day.
The Duncan selection includes Poem Beginning With A Line by Pindar, which is easily one of his best amp brightest.
Dorn's The Hide of My Mother presages his most sarcastic works, but with an inner view which his late works avoid.
Could have done better with Levertov amp Blaser, but a stunning
selection of Lamantia poems, leading off with Terror Conduction, which makes the hair stand on end.
choruses from Kerouac's fabulous Mexico City Blues, Partsamp II of Howl, Sunflower Sutra, Corso's Marraige, all exemplary works from what was to become the beat canon.
The NY School could have been more illuminating, but Koch's Thank You rocks, and O'Hara's whole selection is utterly mindblowing.
These are still my favorite O'Hara poems, Ashbery's Instruction Manual is still used in workshops because it is so perfect, and How Long Will I Be Able To Inhabit the Divine Sepulchre is one of the flarfiest Ashbery poems I know of.
Nice Whalen selections, and Snyder's Riprap sort of round out that scene, The John Weiners poems are so intense amp burning that I remember not being able to forget them, still.
Then closing out with some essays, like Olson's Projective Verse and the like, this book was absolutely crucial for me amp many others.
I constituted my first reading lists from this book, I don't think I could possibly recommend it enough, Does it have shortcomings You bet, Very few women, it's missing Ted Berrigan who wasn't publishing much at the time, but came to be so much a part of this mileu, maybe not enough Barbara Guest, but even so, a masterpiece.
I took a poetry class with this as a supplementary text, I enjoyed most of the poetry therein but found the selections at times a little frustrating for a lack of giving me a 'taste' of the poet featured.
Perhaps the most important poetry collection of theth century, certainly in American poetry, A veritable who's who of postwar American poetry granted, primarily of those who happen to be both white and male to Allen's credit, this collection's purview is too late for the Harlem Renaissance, and it came out right before the explosion of exciting, radical black poetry of thes, although they are preempted by Amiri Baraka's as LeRoi Jones inclusion, this book nearly singlehandedly delineated the landscape of thencontemporary poetry and does more to capture a kind of canon than Harold Bloom could have ever dreamt of.
Can be paired with Al Alvarez's more obscure The New Poetry, which endeavoured to extend the effort to poets of the UK, with much of the same prescience.
so much talk of this collection amp it's 'ground broken' in contemp, amer. poe. so to hold my face i can't not read it any longer, I read the first part of this in full because it was assigned for uni and then went through the rest and just read what I was interested in.
As with any anthology there are highs and lows, but overall it's easy to see why this was so influential.
I hadn't read much poetry from the era before so some of it was beyond me, but the sheer amount of great poems and important poets included here is immense.
I'm sure it's one I'll keep coming back to and maybe one day I'll even be able to get my head around the Olson poems.
The New American Poetry is considered a landmark anthology, thanks in no small part to the fact that many of the poets selected herein went on to become among the most influential American poets of the second half of the twentieth century.
Among them: Charles Olson, Robert Duncan, Denise Levertov, Paul Blackburn, Robert Creeley, Larry Eigner,Edward Dorn, Joel Oppenheimer, Helen Adam,Madeline Gleason, Lawrence Ferlinghetti, Robin Blaser,Jack Spicer, Allen Ginsberg, Barbara Guest, James Schuyler, Kenneth Koch, Frank O'Hara, John Ashbery,Philip Whalen, and Amiri Baraka LeRoi Jones.
One must commend editor Donald Allen for his foresight, and forgive him for his lack of diversity Allen, like Olson, "salutes the cock".
. .
I. Le Bonheur,
dogwood flakes
what is green
the petals
from the apple
blow on the road
mourning doves
mark the sway
of the afternoon, bees
dig the plum blossoms
the morning
stands up straight, the night
is blue from the full of the April moon
iris and lilac, birds
birds, yellow flowers
white flowers, the Diesel
does not let up dragging
the plow
as the whippoorwill,
the nights tractor, grinds
his song
and no other birds but us
are as busy O saisons, O chateaux!
Délires!
What soul
is without fault
Nobody studies
happiness
Every time the cock crows
I salute him
I have no longer any excuse
for envy.
My life
has been given its orders: the seasons
seize
the soul and the body, and make mock
of any dispersed effort.
The hour of death
is the only trespass"sitelinkVariations Done for Gerald Van De Wiele", sitelinkCharles Olson, pg.
good wood
that all fiery youth burst fourth from winter,
go to sleep in the poem.
Who will remember thy green flame,
thy dream's amber
Language obeyd flares tongues in obscure matter.
We trace faces in clouds: they drift apart,
Palaces of air. The sun dying down
sets them on fire,
Descry shadows on the flood from its dazzling mood,
or at its shore read runes upon the sand
from seaspume.
This is what I wanted for the last poem,
A loosening of conventions and return to open form,
Leonardo saw figures that were stains upon a wall,
Let the apparitions containd in the ground
play as they will,
You have carried a branch of tomorrow into the room,
Its fragrance has awakend me, No. .
It was the sound of a fire on the hearth
Leapd up where you bankd it
.
. . sparks of delight. Now I return the though
to the red glow, that mightbemagical blood,
palaces of heat in the fire's mouth,
if you look you will see the salamander
to the very elements that attend us,
fairies of the fire, the radiant crawling.
.
That was a long time ago,
No. They were never really there,
though once I saw did I stare
into the heart of desire burning
and see a radiant man like those
fancy cities from fire into fire falling.
We are close enough to childhood, so easily purged
of whatever we thought we were to be.
Flamey threads of firstness go out from your touch,
flickers of unlikely heat
at the edge of our belief bud forth"sitelinkFood for Fire, Food for Thought", sitelinkRobert Duncan, pg.
I like to find
what's not found
at once, but lies
within something of another nature,
in repose, distinct.
Gull feathers of glass, hidden
in white pulp: the bones of squid
which I pull out and lay
blade by blade on the draining board
tapered as if for swiftness, to pierce
the heart, but fragile, substance
belying design.
Or a fruit, mamey,
cased in rough brown peel, the flesh
roseamber, and the seed:
the seed a stone of wood, carved and
polished, walnutcolored, formed
like a brazilnut, but large,
large enough to fill
the hungry palm of a hand.
I like the juicy stem of grass that grows
within the coarser leaf folded round,
and the butteryellow glow
in the narrow flute from which the morningglory
opens blue and cool on a hot morning.
"sitelinkPleasures", sitelinkDenise Levertov, pg,
Staggering down the road at midnite
home from the bar, the
mexican Bandit stood facing me, about
to improve his standard of living
Two
fingers handled the moustache, gently,
the other hand fingered the pistol.
My asshole
dropped out/
and crawled all the way back to El Paso"The Encounter", sitelinkPaul Blackburn, pg.
For loveI would
split open your head and put
a candle in
behind the eyes.
Love is dead in us
if we forget
the virtues of an amulet
and quick surprise.
"sitelinkThe Warning", sitelinkRobert Creeley, pg,
The children were frightened by crescendos
cars coming forward in the movies
That is, before they found out love,
that is, Comedy
the cheeks blew
music rises and continues
and the sea does
and there were no accidents today
the bombs showered us in the air"A Fete", sitelinkLarry Eigner, pg.
The cowboy stands beneath
a brickorange moon, The top
of his oblong head is blue, the sheath
of his hips
is too.
In the dark brown night
your delicate cowboy stands quite still,
His plain hands are crossed,
His wrists are embossed white,
In the background night is a house,
has a blue chimney top,
Yi Yi, the cowboy's eyes
are blue.
The top of the sky
is too,"Vaquero", sitelinkEdward Dorn, pg,
I wish all the
mandragora grew
wild, screaming,
and in the cattails,
pussywillows, etc,
wind osft as eastern standard time,
wind soft as the
last time you
did it, wind soft
as a soft wind,
I wish we
bathed in essence of
ginseng, for our health,
I wish eastern standard
time, etc, rang the
changes in our hearts,"Blue Funk"sitelinkJoel Oppenheimer, pg,
There was a man who married a maid, SHe laughed as he led her home,
The living fleece of her long bright hair she combed with a golden comb,
He led her home through his barley fields where the saffron poppies grew,
She combed, and whispered, "I love my love, " Her voice like a plaintive coo,
Ha! Ha!
Her voice like a plaintive coo,
He lived alone with his chosen bride, at first their life was sweet,
Sweet was the touch of her playful hair binding his hands and feet,
WHen first she murmured adoring words her words did not appall,
"I love my love with a capitol A, To my love I give my All,
Ah, He!
To my love I give my All, "
She circled him with the secret web she wove as her strong hair grew,
Like a golden spider she wove and sang, "My love is tender and true, "
She combed her hair with a golden comb and shackled him to a tree,
She shackled him close to the Tree of Life, "My love I'll never set free,
No, No.
My love I'll never set free, "
"I Love My Love"sitelinkHelen Adam, pg,
Cross at the morning
and at waking,
with a mourning for summer,
she crossed the bridge Now
over the river Gone
toward the place called New
to begin her Once Upon.
Once and Upon
my daddy long legs
walked in a web of work
for my sisters and me,
as Mother spun round
with silver knives and forks
in a shining of pans,
a wash of Mondays
and plans
for our lives ten thousand weeks.
To cross the bridge Now
over the river Gone
toward the place called New
to begin her Once Upon,
in a mourning for summer, she moved
to write her right becoming
and find her true beloved.
"Once and Upon", sitelinkMadeline Gleason, pg,
He is one of the prophets come back
He is one of the wiggy prophets come back
He had a beard in the Old Testament
but shaved it off in Paterson
He has a microphone around his neck
at a poetry reading
and he is more than one poet
and he is an old man perpetually writing a poem
about an old man
whose every third through is Death
and who is writing a poem
about an old man
whose every third thought is Death
and who is writing a poem
Like the picture on a Quaker Oats box
that shows a figure holding up a box
upon which is a picture of a figure
holding up a box
and the figure smaller and smaller
and further away each time
a picture of shrinking reality itself
He is one of the prophets come back
to see to hear to file a revised report
on the present state
of the shrinking world
.
. ."He", sitelinkLawrence Ferlinghetti, pg,
It is their way to find the surface
when they die,
Fish feed on fish
and drop those beautiful bones
to swim,
I see them stretch the water to their need
as I domesticate the separate air to be my
breath.
These fish die easily,
I find my surface in the way they feed,
Their gathering hunger is a flash like death,
No agony
as if
my mind had eaten death"Poem by the Charles River", sitelinkRobin Blaser, pg.
Poetry, almost blind like a camera
Is alive in sight only for a second.
Click,
Snap goes the eyelid of the eye before movement
Almost as the world happens.
One would not choose to blink and go blind
After the instant, One would not choose
To see the continuous Platonic pattern of birds flying
Long after the stream of birds had dropped or had nested.
Lucky for us that there are visible things like oceans
Which are always around,
Continuous, disciplined adjuncts
To the moment of sight.
Sight
But not so sweet
As we have seen,
When I praise the sun or any bronze god derived from it
Don't think I wouldn't rather praise the very tall blond boy
Who ate all of my potatochips at the Red Lizard.
It's just that I won't see him when I open my eyes
And I will see the sun.
Things like the sun are always there when the eyes are open
Insistent as breath.
One can only worship
These cold eternals for their support of
What is absolutely temporary.
But not so sweet,
The temporary tempts poetry
Tempts photographs, tempts eyes,
"Imaginary Elegies, I"sitelinkJack Spicer, pg,
What thoughts I have of you tonight Walt Whitman, for I walked down the sidestreets under the trees with a headache selfconscious looking at the full moon.
In my hungry fatigue, and shopping for images, I went into the neon fruit supermarket, dreaming of your enumerations!
What peaches and what penumbras! Whole families shopping at night! Aisles full of husbands! Wives in the avocados, babies in the tomatoes!and you, Garcia Lorca, what were you doing down by the watermelons
.
. ."sitelinkA Supermarket in California", sitelinkAllen Ginsberg, pg,
I go separately
The sweet knees of oxen have pressed a path for me
ghosts with ingots have burned their bare hands
it is the dungaree darkness with China stitched
where the westerly winds
and the travelers checks
the evensong of salesmen
the glistening paraphernalia of twin suitcases
where no one speaks English.
I go separately
It is the wind, the rubber wind
when we brush our teeth in the way station
a climate to beard.
What forks these roads
Who clammers oer the twain
What murmurs and rustles in the distance
in the white branches where the light is whipped
piercing at the crossing as into the dunes we simmer
and toss ourselves awhile the motor pants like a forest
where owls from their bandaged eyes send messages
to the Indian couple.
Peaks have you heard
I go separately
We have reached the arithmetics, are partially quenched
while it growls and hints in the lost trappers voice
She is coming toward us like a session of pines
in the wild wooden air where rabbits are frozen,
O mother of lakes and glaciers, save us gamblers
whose wagon is perilously rapt.
"sitelinkSanta Fe Trail"sitelinkBarbara Guest, pg,
A chimney, breathing a little smoke,
The sun, I can't see
making a bit of pink
I can't quite see in the blue.
The pink of five tulips
at five p, m. on the day before March first,
The green of the tulip stems and leaves
like something I can't remember,
finding a jackinthepulpit
a long time ago and far away.
Why it was December then
and the sun was on the sea
by the temples we'd gone to see.
"sitelinkFebruary", sitelinkJames Schuyler, pg,
At the Poem Society a blackhaired man stands up to say
“You make me sick with all your talk about restraint and mature talent!
Havent you ever looked out the window at a painting by Matisse,
Or did you always stay in hotels where there were too many spiders crawling on your visages
Did you ever glance inside a bottle of sparkling pop,
Or see a citizen split in two by the lightning
I am afraid you have never smiled at the hibernation
Of bear cubs except that you saw in it some deep relation
To human suffering and wishes, oh what a bunch of crackpots!”
The blackhaired man sits down, and the others shoot arrows at him.
"sitelinkFresh Air, I", sitelinkKenneth Koch, pg,
Hate is only one of many responses
true, hurt and hate go hand in hand
but why be afraid of hate, it is only there
think of filth, is it really awesome
neither is hate
don't be shy of unkindness, either
it's cleansing and allows you to be direct
like an arrow that feels something
out and out meanness, too, lets love breathe
you don't have to fight off getting in too deep
you can always get out if you're not too scared
an ounce of prevention's
enough to poison the heart
don't think of others
until you have thought of yourself, are true
all of these things, if you feel them
will be graced by a certain reluctance
and turn into gold
if felt by me, will be smilingly defected
by your mysterious concern"Poem", sitelinkFrank O'Hara, pg.
As I sit looking out of a window of the building
I wish I did not have to write the instruction manual on the uses of a new metal.
I look down into the street and see people, each walking with an inner peace,
And envy themthey are so far away from me!
Not one of them has to worry about getting out this manual on schedule.
And, as my way is, I begin to dream, resting my elbows on the desk and leaning out of the window a little,
Of dim Guadalajara! City of rosecolored flowers!
City I wanted most to see, and most did not see, in Mexico!
But I fancy I see, under the press of having to write the instruction manual,
Your public square, city, with its elaborate little bandstand!
The band is playing Scheherazade by RimskyKorsakov.
Around stand the flower girls, handing out rose and lemoncolored flowers,
Each attractive in her roseandblue striped dress Oh! such shades of rose and blue,
And nearby is the little white booth where women in green serve you green and yellow fruit.
The couples are parading everyone is in a holiday mood,
First, leading the parade, is a dapper fellow
Clothed in deep blue, On his head sits a white hat
And he wears a mustache, which has been trimmed for the occasion.
His dear one, his wife, is young and pretty her shawl is rose, pink, and white.
Her slippers are patent leather, in the American fashion,
And she carries a fan, for she is modest, and does not want the crowd to see her face too often.
"sitelinkThe Instruction Manual", sitelinkJohn Ashbery, pg,
What I need is lots of money
No
What I need is somebody to love with unparalleled energy and devotion forhours amp then goodbye
I can escape too easily from this time amp this place
That isn't the reason I'm here
What I need is where am I
Sometimes a bed of nails is really necessary to any man
Or a wall Olson, in conversation, "That wall, it has to be there!"
Where are my hands.
Where are my lungs,
All the lights are on in here I don't see nothing,
I don't admit that this is personality disintegration
My personality has a halflife ofyears besides
I can put my toe in my mouth
If CENSORED, then CENSORED, something like
Plato his vision of the archetypal human being
Or the Gnostic Worm.
People see me they like that, . .
I try to warn them that it's really me
They don't listen afterwards they complain
About how I had no right to really be just that:
Invisible amp in complete control of everything.
"Take,::", sitelinkPhilip Whalen, pg,
for Kellie Jones, bornMay
Lately, I've become accustomed to the way
The ground opens up and envelopes me
Each time I go out to walk the dog.
Or the broad edged silly music the wind
Makes when I run for a bus.
. .
Things have come to that,
And now, each night I count the,
And each night I get the same number.
And when they will not come to be counted,
I count the holes they leave.
Nobody sings anymore,
And then last night, I tiptoed up
To my daughter's room