The Best American Poetry

Dan Beachy-Quick's Answers [by H. L. Hix]

Dan Beachy-Quick is the author of Mulberry.

1. What poet should be in Obama’s cabinet, and in what role?

Pindar. Press Secretary.

2. If you could send Obama one poem or book of poems (not your own), what would it be and why?

I think I might send along Dickinson’s “My life had stood—a loaded gun.” I don’t know why exactly. Inexactly, I think I have a guess as to why. The odd/awful power of that poem is that the speaker has no power of her own, but in order to gain meaning, must be put to use. She cannot put herself to use. It strikes me that being President might be a similar sort of situation. To take that oath is to load the chamber and wait in the corner (save the oval office has no corners?) At any rate, we’ve had leadership for 8 years that is a gun that pulls its own trigger. Perhaps a poem, too, can inaugurate a new model.

Christine Gelineau's Answers [by H. L. Hix]

Christine Gelineau is the author of Remorseless Loyalty, and co-editor of French Connections: A Gathering of Franco-American Poets.

1. What poet should be in Obama’s cabinet, and in what role?
Reginald Shepard.

4. Who is the most exciting new poet I’ve never heard of, but whose work I ought to find and read?
Patrick Phillips and Maurya Simon have received enough high profile attention probably not to qualify for this category . . .           

Cecilia Woloch's Answers [by H. L. Hix]

Cecilia Woloch is the author of four collections of poetry, most recently a chapbook, Narcissus, winner of the Tupelo Press Snowbound Prize. A new book-length collection of poems is forthcoming from BOA Editions in 2009.

1. What poet should be in Obama’s cabinet, and in what role?

Leonard Cohen, even though he's not American -- or maybe because he's not American? He could be the bard-in-residence, or the secretary of passion and irony; he could sing "Democracy Is Coming to the USA" on the White House lawn.

2. If you could send Obama one poem or book of poems (not your own), what would it be and why?

I'd send him that little Shambala edition of Whitman's Song of Myself, because it's visionary and inspiring and great to read out loud.

4. Who is the most exciting young/new poet I’ve never heard of, but whose work I ought to find and read?

Natalie G. Diaz, Douglas Kearney

More Thursday Musings [by H. L. Hix]

Stephen Burt puts us onto the work of Vivek Narayanan, to a cluster of whose poems this link leads: http://www.openspaceindia.org/vivek_poem.htm.  I especially love the buzzing presence of “the mosquito hour” in the “Oddessa, Texas” poem.

Burt also mentions as funny poems he has read lately “several recent poems by Albert Goldbarth.”  Who is one poet we can be sure is NOT reading this blog.  The bio note to his book Griffin ends with the assertion that “his fingers have never touched a computer keyboard.”  Which hasn’t kept his poems from showing up on-line, as for example at this link.

The “young/new poet” question has given me a lot of new poets to look for, but Evie Shockley mentions among her suggestions at least one such poet of whose work I’m already a fan: Lyrae Van Clief-Stefanon.  Here’s a link.

Stephen Burt's Answers [by H. L. Hix]

Stephen Burt teaches at Harvard; his new blog, and forthcoming book, are both called Close Calls with Nonsense (www.closecallswithnonsense.com-- just launched).

1. What poet should be in Obama’s cabinet, and in what role?

Since the President-Elect already has good plans (it seems) for most Cabinet-level appointments, I’ve placed most of these poets in federal agencies and subcabinet-level positions instead: Mark Nowak, OSHA; Monica Youn, Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights; Forrest Gander, United States Geological Survey; Jeffrey Yang, National Atmospheric and Oceanic Adminstration (NOAA); Albert Goldbarth, National Archives; Ed Roberson, HUD; Donald Revell, Interior; Robyn Schiff, Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC).

Evie Shockley's Answers [by H. L. Hix]

Evie Shockley is the author of /a half-red sea/ and currently guest edits /jubilat/.  She teaches African American literature and creative writing at Rutgers University, New Brunswick.

2. If you could send Obama one poem or book of poems (not your own), what would it be and why?

I couldn’t limit myself to one.  I’d make him an annual gift of poetry, and even then there’d be more than one book included each year.  Let’s say I’d start with these two: Blacks, by Gwendolyn Brooks, because she shares his connection to Chicago and because it includes about 40 years of exquisitely wrought, historically conscious, and genuinely compassionate poetry; and The Activist, by Renee Gladman, because it is one of prose poetry’s most shining contributions to the critique of the era of the Bush Administration.  Both of these volumes illustrate the vital importance of language: the former by example, insofar as Brooks is a precise wizard of word selection, and the latter by depicting, as Gladman does so well, what happens when power mangles our mode of communication for the purpose of obscuring its wrongdoing and foul motives.

3. What other poetry-related blog or website should I check out?

Right now, especially, the Delirious Hem (http://www.delirioushem.blogspot.com/), where there is an advent calendar presenting daily doses of women’s experimental/post-avant poetry.  Now through Christmas Eve only!

Jesse Nathan's Answers [by H. L. Hix]

Jesse Nathan is the author of Dinner (a chapbook of poems), an editor at McSweeney's publishing in San Francisco, and the managing editor of the Best American Nonrequired Reading.

1. What poet should be in Obama’s cabinet, and in what role?

This question befuddles me. It’s hard to imagine a full-time poet being a full-time government official. I don’t know if that would do either poetry or government any good.

2. If you could send Obama one poem or book of poems (not your own), what would it be and why?

Maybe Madoc by Paul Muldoon. For its sheer wit and bizarre perspective on American history and thought. Maybe “Ozymandias,” by Shelley, for its warning. Or “Stalin Epigram,” by Mandelstam. It’s one of the few successful overtly political poems I’ve ever come across. It’s brave and chilling. Every leader should probably read it. “The Art of Losing,” by Bishop, for its humility and wisdom. Work by ee cummings and A.R. Ammons, for their philosophical zing and strange steely slices of Americana.

Wednesday Wanderings [by H. L. Hix]

Honorée Fanonne Jeffers and I have long suspected that we are twins separated at birth.  I take the suspicion as now conclusively confirmed by her identifying as the lines that haunt her the last couplet of Robert Hayden’s exquisite poem “Those Winter Sundays.”  Those two lines have haunted me for years, and their presence only grows stronger.  Is there a more perfectly realized short lyric poem in the English language?

 Hayden’s poem can be found here. 

Jeffers also gives an interesting rationale for her nomination of Lucille Clifton for President: “I think Lucille Clifton should run for President because Miss Lucille has this way of making people of all backgrounds love her even when she’s telling them difficult truths. That’s exactly what we need right now.”  I’d probably have to agree with James Longenbach that having the attributes of a poet implies nothing about having the attributes of a politician, but I’d also agree with Jeffers’ implicit premise, that there may be various attributes (the attributes of wisdom, for example?) that would be virtues in regard to either office.

Honorée Fanonne Jeffers' Answers

Honorée Fanonne Jeffers is the author of Red Clay Suite. She teaches at the University of Oklahoma. Here are her answers to our twenty questions.

1. What poet should be in Obama’s cabinet, and in what role?

Elizabeth Alexander, as Secretary of Education.

2. If you could send Obama one poem or book of poems (not your own), what would it be and why?

Native Guard by Natasha Trethewey.  This book powerfully chronicles her life as a daughter of the Mississippi Gulf Coast, a sadly neglected region of the United States.

Danielle Pafunda's Answers

Danielle Pafunda is the author of My Zorba and Pretty Young Thing.

1. What poet should be in Obama’s cabinet, and in what role?

Mina Loy, secretary of Corpses and Geniuses.  There is, at this site, an interesting petition for Obama to include a Secretary of the Arts.

2. If you could send Obama one poem or book of poems (not your own), what would it be and why?

Well, if I’m remembering my CNN, Obama took some poetry in college, so I’ll guess he’s familiar with the genre.   Still, any one book seems insufficient.  Maybe a presidential course reader?