poems i like

A partial list

• "Ways of Being Lonely," Kim Addonizio

• "Dracula, By Marriage," Sara Deniz Akant 

• "The Frog Priests of Amherst, Virginia," Dan Albergotti

• "William of Aquitaine Returns," Luis Alberto de Cuenca

• "Everything," A.R. Ammons

• “The Desire to Be Oneself,” Homero Aridjis

• "Musée des Beaux Arts," W.H. Auden

• "Petition," W.H. Auden

• "My Hair Burned Like Berenice," Ruth Awad

• "When Grief Made Us," Ruth Awad

• "After," David Baker

• "Overture to Boy about to Walk in on Parents," John Coleman Bennett

• “Epithalamion in the Wake,” Ariana Benson

• "The Bight," Elizabeth Bishop

• "The Box of Chocolates," Robert Bly

• "Ghost," Bruce Bond

• "Song of Welcome," Joseph Brodsky

• "Herman's Bones," Amelia Bueno

• "The Shortest Night," Victoria Chang

• "The Sun," Dan Chiasson

• "What Was Your First Concert?" Paula Cisewski

• "Peel the Black Walnut Bark Like Small Fists in Our Fists," Christopher Citro

• "Blessing the Boats," Lucille Clifton

• "Bouquet," Lucille Clifton

• "jasper texas 1998," Lucille Clifton

• "Poem For My Yellow Coat," Lucille Clifton

• "shadows," Lucille Clifton

• "Shiva," Andrea Cohen

• "Lingonberry Jam," Henri Cole

• "Melancholy’s Mirror," Robert Cording

• “At Fifty I Am Startled to Find I Am in My Splendor,” Sandra Cisneros

• "Life," Robert Chiwamba (Translated by Benedicto Wokomaatani Malunga)

• "The War," Suzanne Cleary

• "Always I've been trying to show you," Melissa Crowe

• "At the Poetry Festival," Najwan Darwish

• "Notes for My Funeral," Alex Dimitrov 

• "Trophic Cascade," Camille T. Dungy

• "She Dwells in Violet," dg nanouk okpik

• "Nina Blues," Cornelius Eady

• "The Iguanas Skitter Through the Cemetery by the Sea," Martín Espada 

• "Constantly Risking Absurdity (#15)," Lawrence Ferlinghetti

• "Unbroken," Nick Flynn

• "Small Craft Talk," Dobby Gibson

• "A Brief for the Defense," Jack Gilbert

• "Abundance," Louise Glück

• "Dawn," Louise Glück

• "The Denial of Death," Louise Glück

• "Over and Above," Jennifer Grotz

• "Those Winter Sundsays," Robert Hayden

• "A Cottony Fate," Jane Hirshfield

• "First Light Edging Cirrus," Jane Hirshfield

• "Interruption: An Assay," Jane Hirshfield

• "My Debt," Jane Hirshfield

• "Wetness: An Assay," Jane Hirshfield

• "Homage to a Picture Bride," Garrett Hongo

• "Anything Can Happen," Horace (Translated by Seamus Heaney)

• “Sport,” Langston Hughes

• "Third Wish," Maria Hummel

• "Ruthless," Omotara James

• "Serenade of Excellence," Kim Min Jeong (Translated by Soeun Seo and Jake Levine)

• "To a Late Poplar," Patrick Kavanagh

• "Wind Trumps the World," Garret Keizer

• "My Mother," Jane Kenyon

• "Ode to the Maggot," Yusef Komunyakaa

• "Yellowjackets," Yusef Komunyakaa

• "Flesh," Deborah Landau

• “Sad Steps,” Philip Larkin

• "A Poem Avoiding Its Own Tour of Force," Steven Leyva

• "French Sentence," Esther Lin

• “Cat’s Cradle,” Amit Majmudar

• "Coyotes by the Eliot House," Glyn Maxwell

• "164 East 72nd Street," James Merrill

• "Conqueror," M.S. Merwin

• "Wind Farm, Texas," Ange Mlinko

• "The Way My Mother Explained the Rain," Michael Montlack

• "The Citizen," Pablo Neruda

• "Night on the Island," Pablo Neruda

• "Interpreting Dreams," Megan Nichols

• "The Buttonhook," Yehoshua November

• "The Dim Tenements," D. Nurkse

• "Topography," Greg Oaks

• "Blossom Trees," Sharon Olds.

• “Cliché,” V. Penelope Pelizzon

• "Gifts," John Pijewski

• “Rowan Tree,” Rowan Ricardo Phillips

• "Heretic That I Am," Tomás Q. Morín

• "Ancient Winter," Salvatore Quasimodo

• "Again A Green River," Salvatore Quasimodo

• "Muxica," Alberto Rios

• "Somebody Else's Baby." Mary Jo Salter

• “A Penis Moon,” James Schuyler

• "Something Like We Did III," Tim Seibles

• "Admonitions to a Special Person," Anne Sexton

• “The Poet of Ignorance,” Anne Sexton

• "F Scott," Diane Seuss

• "Pennsylvania," Natalie Shapero

• "About Myself," Charles Simic

• "Could This Be Me?" Charles Simic

• "[The dead man steps down from the scaffold.]," Charles Simic

• "Good Bones," Maggie Smith

• "Failure," A.E. Stallings

• "Little Song in the Locrian," Timmy Straw

• "The Open Window," Tomas Tranströmer

• "Slow Music," Tomas Tranströmer

• "North of Mist," Wendy Videlock

• "Wood Working at the End of the World," Ocean Vuong

• "The Task Rejected," Philip Whalen

• "The Plague of Poets," C.D. Wright

• "Time Is a Graceless Enemy, but Purls as It Comes and Goes," Charles Wright

• “Lustre,” C. Dale Young

• "Exhaustion," Saadi Youssef

• "About Joy and Loss," Yu Xuanji (Translated by Peter Levitt and Rebecca Nie)

As of April 18, 2025.  A partial list. More poems coming.