1 AMANDA GORMAN is an “American poet and activist,” according to Wikipedia.
2 CATE MARVIN “THE REPUBLICAN PARTY IS EVIL. Straight up evil. It’s just beyond.” –Facebook
3 LOUISE GLUCK 2020 Nobel Prize for Literature
4 JOY HARJO In her third term as Poet Laureate.
5 DON MEE CHOI DMZ Colony, Wave Books, wins 2020 National Book Award.
6 JERICHO BROWN The Tradition, Copper Canyon Press, wins 2020 Pulitzer Prize
7 NOOR HINDI Poem “Fuck Your Lecture on Craft, My People Are Dying” in Dec 2020 Poetry.
8 NAOMI SHIHAB NYE Her poem “kindness” read online by Emma Thompson has 2.3 million Instagram views
9 WAYNE MILLER “When Talking About Poetry Online Goes Very Wrong” 2/8/21 essay in Lithub.
10 WILLIAM LOGAN “she speaks in the voice of a documentary narrator, approaching scenes in a hazmat suit.”
11 VICTORIA CHANG Obit Copper Canyon Press, longlist for 2020 National Book Award; also, in BAP.
12 ALAN CORDLE founder of Foetry, “most despised..most feared man in American poetry” —LA Times 2005
13 RUPI KAUR Has sold 3 million books
14 DON SHARE Resigned as Poetry editor August of 2020.
15 MARY RUEFLE Dunce, Wave Books, finalist for 2020 Pulitzer Prize
16 ANTHONY CODY Borderland Apocrypha, longlist for 2020 National Book Award
17 LILLIAN-YVONNE BERTRAM Travesty Generator, longlist for 2020 National Book Award
18 EDUARDO C. CORRAL Guillotine, longlist for 2020 National Book Award
19 PAISLEY REKDAL Poet Laureate of Utah, Guest editor for the 2020 Best American Poetry
20 DORIANNE LAUX Only As the Day is Long: New and Selected Poems, Norton, finalist for 2020 Pulitzer Prize
21 DANEZ SMITH Latest book of poems, Homie, published in 2020.
22 ILYA KAMINSKY LA Times Book Prize in 2020 for Deaf Republic.
23 RON SILLIMAN in Jan. 2021 Poetry “It merely needs to brush against the hem of your gown.”
24 FORREST GANDER Be With, New Directions, winner of the 2019 Pulitzer Prize
25 RITA DOVE Her Penguin Twentieth-Century of American Poetry Anthology is 10 years old. Collected Poems, 2016.
26 NATALIE DIAZ Postcolonial Love Poem, longlist for 2020 National Book Award
27 TERRANCE HAYES “I love how your blackness leaves them in the dark.”
28 TIMOTHY DONNELLY The Problem of the Many, Wave Books, 2019
29 REGINALD DWAYNE BETTS In 2020 BAP
30 FRANK BIDART Half-light: Collected Poems 1965-2016 (FSG) winner, 2018 Pulitzer
31 OCEAN VUONG “this is how we loved: a knife on the tongue turning into a tongue”
32 MATTHEW ZAPRUDER Disputed Ocean Vuong’s Instagram reflections on metaphor.
33 SHARON OLDS Stag’s Leap won 2013 Pulitzer; she’s in 2020 BAP
34 HONOREE FANONNE JEFFERS The Age of Phillis, longlist for 2020 National Book Award.
35 CLAUDIA RANKINE Citizen came out in 2014.
36 HENRI COLE Blizzard, FSG, is his tenth book of poems.
37 TRACY K. SMITH In the New Yorker 10/5
38 DIANE SEUSS In the New Yorker 9/14
39 SUSHMITA GUPTA “She missed her room, her pillow, her side of the bed, her tiny bedside lamp.”
40 ANNE CARSON has translated Sappho and Euripides.
41 AL FILREIS Leads “Poem Talk” with guests on Poetry’s website
42 MARY ANGELA DOUGLAS “the larks cry out and not with music”
43 STEPHEN COLE “…the everlasting living and the longtime dead feast on the same severed, talking head.”
44 MARILYN CHIN Her New and Selected was published in 2018 (Norton).
45 KEVIN GALLAGHER Editor, poet, economist, historian has re-discovered the poet John Boyle O’Reilly.
46 DAVID LEHMAN Series Editor for Best American Poetry—founded in 1988.
47 JIM BEHRLE A thorn in the side of BAP.
48 ROBIN RICHARDSON The Canadian poet wrote recently, “I have removed myself completely from Canadian literature.”
49 PAOLA FERRANTE New editor of Minola Reivew.
50 A.E. STALLINGS Like, FSG, finalist for 2019 Pulitzer
51 TAYLOR JOHNSON Poetry Blog: “felt presence of the black crowd as we study our amongness together.”
52 PATRICA SMITH Incendiary Art, TriQuarterly/Northwestern U, finalist for 2018 Pulitzer
53 TYLER MILLS in Jan. 2021 Poetry “Gatsby is not drinking a gin rickey. Dracula not puncturing a vein.”
54 SEUNGJA CHOI in Jan. 2021 Poetry “Dog autumn attacks. Syphilis autumn.”
55 ATTICUS “It was her chaos that made her beautiful.”
56 JAMES LONGENBACH Essay in Jan. 2021 Poetry, wonders: would Galileo have been jailed were his claims in verse?
57 DAN SOCIU Hit 3 home runs for the Paris Goths in Scarriet’s 2020 World Baseball League.
58 PHILIP NIKOLAYEV Editor of Fulcrum and “14 International Younger Poets” issue from Art and Letters.
59 SUSMIT PANDA “Time walked barefoot; the clock gave it heels.”
60 BRIAN RIHLMANN Poet of working-class honesty.
61 TYREE DAYE in the New Yorker 1/18/21
62 JANE WONG in Dec. 2020 Poetry “My grandmother said it was going to be long—“
63 ALAN SHAPIRO Reel to Reel, University of Chicago Press, finalist for 2015 Pulitzer
64 PIPPA LITTLE in Dec. 2020 Poetry “I knew the names of stones at the river mouth”
65 PATRICK STEWART Read Shakespeare’s Sonnets online to millions of views.
66 STEVEN CRAMER sixth book of poems, Listen, published in 2020.
67 HIEU MINH NGUYEN In 2020 BAP
68 BEN MAZER New book on Harry Crosby. New book of poems. Unearthing poems by Delmore Schwartz for FSG.
69 KEVIN YOUNG Poetry editor of the New Yorker
70 BILLY COLLINS Poet Laureate of the U.S. 2001 to 2003
71 ARIANA REINES In 2020 BAP
72 VALERIE MACON fired as North Carolina poet laureate—when it was found she lacked publishing credentials.
73 ANDERS CARLSON-WEE Nation magazine published, then apologized, for his poem, “How-To,” in 2018.
74 DANA GIOIA 99 Poems: New and Selected published in 2016. His famous Can Poetry Matter? came out in 1992.
75 YUSEF KOMUNYAKAA In 2020 BAP
76 MARJORIE PERLOFF published Edge of Irony: Modernism in the Shadow of the Habsburg Empire in 2016.
77 HELEN VENDLER her The Ocean, the Bird, and the Scholar: Essays on Poets and Poetry came out in 2015.
78 MEI-MEI BERSSENBRUGGE A Treatise On Stars, longlist for 2020 National Book Award—her 13th book.
79 GEORGE BILGERE Belongs to the Billy Collins school. Lives in Cleveland.
80 CAROLYN FORCHE 2020 saw the publication of her book In the Lateness of the World: Poems from Penguin.
81 BOB DYLAN “Shall I leave them by your gate? Or sad-eyed lady, should I wait?”
82 RICHARD HOWARD has translated Baudelaire, de Beauvoir, Breton, Foucault, Camus and Gide.
83 GLYN MAXWELL The playwright/poet’s mother acted in the original Under Milk Wood on Broadway in 1956.
84 KAVEH AKBAR published in Best New Poets
85 D.A. POWELL The poet has received a Paul Engle Fellowship.
86 JOHN YAU In 2020 BAP
87 DAIPAYAN NAIR “Hold me tight. Bones are my immortality…”
88 ANDREEA IULIA SCRIDON in 14 International Younger Poets from Art and Letters.
89 LORI GOMEZ Sassy and sensual internet poet—Romantic who uses F-bombs.
90 JORIE GRAHAM In 2020 BAP
91 SIMON ARMITAGE In the New Yorker 9/28
92 TOMMYE BLOUNT Fantasia for the Man in Blue, longlist for 2020 National Book Award.
93 TYLER KNOTT GREGSON on Twitter: “let us sign/our names/ in the/emptiness”
94 STEPHANIE BURT Close Calls With Nonsense: Reading New Poetry published in 2009
95 WILLIE LEE KINARD III in Jan. 2021 Poetry “The lesbians that lived in the apartment to the left…”
96 MICHAEL DICKMAN His poem about his grandmother in 2020 July/August Poetry was controversial.
97 FATIMAH ASGHAR published in Best New Poets
98 RICK BAROT The Galleons, Milkweed Editions, on longlist for 2020 National Book Award and excerpted in BAP 2020
99 DERRICK MICHAEL HUDSON had his 15 minutes of fame in Best American Poetry 2015.
100 JEAN VALENTINE (d. 12/30/20) in New Yorker 1/18/21
SCARRIET POETRY HOT ONE HUNDRED!
February 15, 2021 at 4:59 pm (A.E Stallings, Alan Cordle, Amanda Gorman, Anne Carson, Ariana Reines, Ben Mazer, Best American Poetry 2015, Billy Collins, Bob Dylan, Brian Rihlmann, Carl Phillips, Carolyn Forche, Cate Marvin, Charles Baudelaire, Claudia Rankine, Daipayan Nair, Dan Sociu, Danez Smith, David Lehman, Delmore Schwartz, Derrick Michael Hudson, Don Share, Dorianne Laux, Fatimah Asghar, Frank Bidart, George Bilgere, Glyn Maxwell, Helen Vendler, Jim Behrle, Jorie Graham, Joy Harjo, Kevin Young, Louise Gluck, Marilyn Chin, Mary Angela Douglas, Michael Dickman, Monday Love, Patricia Smith, Paul Engle, Poetry Hot 100, Richard Howard, Rita Dove, Robin Richardson, Ron Silliman, Rupi Kaur, Sharon Olds, Stephanie Burt, Stephen Cole, Steven Cramer, Sushmita Gupta, Terrance Hayes, The New Yorker, Tracy K. Smith, William Logan)
ON TO SWEET SIXTEEN!
March 22, 2019 at 1:07 pm (Aseem Sundan, Daipayan Nair, Diane Lockward, Edgar Allan Poe, Eliana Vanessa, Khalypso, Linda Ashok, Robin Richardson)
The Bold Bracket
How can poetry be bold? Only by going against the grain of what we expect poetry to be.
All art is trapped in its traditions.
Even the experimental exists within the bounds of what the polite audience has come to expect.
So poetry can never be bold in actuality, and, if so, it is not poetry.
This may sadden the impolite and the avant-garde, but we’re afraid it’s true.
The spectrum might look something like this: Beautiful on one end, and disgusting, on the other.
Art swims in one direction, towards the beautiful. If it partakes of the bold, it may get away with a certain amount of disgust, or shame.
The gradations are extremely fine. Poetry may travel through the embarrassing, or an excess of emotion, to get near the beautiful, for human feelings are always of interest—even if it is a recognition of no interest.
But the only way for a poem to be shocking is to be somewhere on the disgusting scale.
The poet who says they are against war will never shock, never stun, never surprise, since this sentiment is so common among poets, and lacks originality, and also the idea itself is not necessarily beautiful.
But a poet who says they are in favor of war may shock enough to triumph—in terms of the other end of the spectrum.
A pro-war poem would be considered shameful and disgusting.
As these 8 poets in the Bold Bracket of the 2019 Scarriet Poetry March Madness attempt to advance, we might add to our pleasure, as we view the competition, if we keep this in mind. Where are the poets on the scale of the beautiful versus the disgusting? And is there any irony in how they manipulate this scale?
Diane Lockward, the no. 1 seed in the Bold Bracket, attempts to get by Linda Ashok, a poet and editor from India.
“The wife and the dog planned their escape” is Lockward’s line and when two of the noblest creatures in the universe, a “wife” and a “dog” are planning an “escape” we are in the middle of a thrilling and moral adventure, even if we don’t know the underlying situation. Our hearts are moved purely: “The wife and the dog planned their escape.” This is way up on the Beautiful side of the scale.
Linda Ashok offers, “When you have a day, let’s meet and bury it.”
This is far up on the Beautiful scale, too. And why? Because it is speech. It talks to you. It is not in the third person, like “The wife and the dog planned their escape.”
The poet who is speaking is making an offer to another person to escape—all of us are trapped, and we rarely “have a day,” and now another person wants to meet you and “bury” the day—this could mean anything; is it to forget? Or be with a person? Or bury the day for later use? The phrase is intriguing, but it also sounds like an idiom people use every day, which has its dangers when the goal is to make original poetry. When Paul McCartney dreamed “Yesterday” and first wrote it down he was afraid it was stolen, and was not original. This bedevils every poet—poetry’s coin is the word, which people use all day every day. Poetry is the “escape” from the common place; we want to “bury” the common day, the common word.
When writing in the third person, we tend to operate within the realm of the incomplete: “The wife and the dog planned their escape” sounds like the beginning of a story. It is nowhere near complete, and this is its charm: “The wife and the dog planned their escape.”
When writing in the first person, as in speech, “When you have a day, let’s meet and bury it,” the operative condition is completeness. There’s more finality when someone utters something, and this surely fits the bill: “When you have a day, let’s meet and bury it.” This is the plan: “When you have a day, let’s meet and bury it;” we are not talking about someone talking about a plan: “The wife and the dog planned their escape.” The third person is farther away, in every sense, and this is why the third person tends to exist in the wide, long views of novels and fiction, that expansiveness the introverted poet in his cave, who likes things to happen immediately, does not envy.
Still, the long view of “The wife and the dog planned their escape” still works in a poem. The poet can be extroverted. The poet can say more things than fiction can. The success of a poem obeys no rules.
“The wife and the dog planned their escape” by Diane Lockward advances to the Sweet Sixteen.
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Aseem Sundan tangles with Robin Richardson, who lives in Canada and edits an all women review.
Aseem Sundan’s “How do I make the paper turn blood red?/How do I make everyone read it?” is bold—but also helpless and desperate. Since poetry can never really be bold, it helps when the bold turns in on itself as it does here: “How do I? How do I?”
Robin Richardson pleads in a very similar manner, “Please let me be a blaze. I will destroy,/I mean create again this place.”
Aseem Sundan makes a bolder, more particular, and more universal statement, to our ears.
Aseem Sundan “How do I make the paper turn blood red?/How do I make everyone read it?” has made it to the Sweet Sixteen.
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Eliana Vanessa, a young poet from New Orleans clashes with Khalypso, a very young poet from Sacramento, California.
Vanessa: “I’d rather be outside, with him,/turning stones in the rain,/than here,/listening to the hum/of so many skulls, alone.” This conjures up all we have seen so far in this bracket: first person speech, finality, pleading and, of course, the bold.
Khalypso has given us what feels more like the beginning of a story, “to wake up/strangers & sticky & questioning.”
The “poem” (closed) versus “the story”(open) can produce great tension in poetry; and every device imaginable—point of view, rhythm, syntax, character, mystery, clarity—contributes. The risk of closing the opening too quickly or being too open in a closed manner may find the writing to be obscure. We always need to know certain things.
In a close contest, Eliana Vanessa wins.
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Edgar Poe will only advance to the Sweet Sixteen if he defeats Daipayan Nair.
Edgar Poe “boldly rides” with “Over the mountains/of the moon,/Down the valley of the shadow”
Daipayan Nair is an urgent, prolific poet.
Poets who achieve anything tend to be one of two types: massively prolific or eerily precise. Some poets work and work on each poem and each poem is a gem. The prolific poet is like a garden run wild; from the massive output, a few gems drop. The sum total of great poems in each case tends to be the same.
Poe was a master of haunting precision who did not spend a lot of time writing poems. The vast majority of his output was prose.
Poe’s opponent in the 2019 March Madness, Daipayan Nair, is prolific, but since his best poems tend to be brief, Nair has many properties of the poets who modestly court, with a serious face, the exact. Daipayan doesn’t orate like Whitman, or shout like Ginsberg. (Okay, maybe sometimes!) He etches delicately on glass the roaring furnace of his feelings.
“I run, run, run and run/Still I don’t reach my birth/I don’t cross my death” by Daipayan Nair is similar in spirit to Poe’s lines.
The Poe, as one might think, is fanatical in its simplicity—over the mountains, and down the valley, I go.
Daipayan Nair’s is divided: “I run, I run, I don’t, I don’t.” We should note the verbs: “reach” my birth and “cross” my death. Is to reach one, to cross the other? A marvelous terror is implied. Running never seemed so desperate and sad.
The moon looks down on Poe’s followers, who cannot believe the result.
Diapayan Nair has reached the Sweet Sixteen!
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Still to come:
The Mysterious Bracket
Jennifer Barber mixes it up with Sridala Swami.
Srividya Sivakumar takes on Nabina Das.
Aakriti Kuntal has to deal with Kushal Poddar
Merryn Juliette and Michelina Di Martino go toe to toe.
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The Life Bracket
William Logan, the poet and critic, squares off against Sam Sax.
Danez Smith attempts to defeat Stephen Cole.
Divya Guha with take on Alec Solomita
N Ravi Shankar will play Kim Gek Lin Short
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The Beautiful Bracket
Mary Angela Douglas has her hands full with Sharanya Manivannan.
Ann Leshy Wood must duel Jennifer Robertson.
Medha Singh will take on Raena Shiraldi.
Sushmita Gupta goes up against C.P. Surendran.
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