Every Riven Thing

Poetry’s archives are incomparable, and to celebrate the magazine’s centennial, editors Don Share and Christian Wiman combed them to create a new kind of anthology, energized by the self-imposed limitation to one hundred poems. Rather than attempting to be exhaustive or definitive—or even to offer the most familiar works—they have assembled a collection of poems that, in their juxtaposition, echo across a century of poetry. Adrienne Rich appears alongside Charles Bukowski; poems by Isaac Rosenberg and Randall Jarrell on the two world wars flank a devastating Vietnam War poem by the lesser-known George Starbuck; August Kleinzahler’s “The Hereafter” precedes “Prufrock,” casting Eliot’s masterpiece in a new light. Short extracts from Poetry’s letters and criticism punctuate the verse selections, hinting at themes and threads and serving as guides, interlocutors, or dissenting voices.

The resulting volume is an anthology like no other, a celebration of idiosyncrasy and invention, a vital monument to an institution that refuses to be static, and, most of all, a book that lovers of poetry will devour, debate, and keep close at hand.

Every Riven Thing is Christian Wiman's first collection in seven years, and rarely has a book of poetry so borne the stamp of necessity. Whether in stark, haiku-like descriptions of a cancer ward, surrealistic depictions of a social order coming apart, or fluent, defiant outpourings of praise, Wiman pushes his language and forms until they break open, revealing startling new truths within. The poems are joyful and sorrowful at the same time, abrasive and beautiful, densely physical and credibly mystical. They attest to the human hunger to feel existence, even at its most harrowing, and the power of art to make our most intense experiences not only apprehensible but transfiguring.

Every Riven Thing is Christian Wimans first collection in seven years, and rarely has a book of poetry so borne the stamp of necessity. Whether in stark, haiku-like descriptions of a cancer ward, surrealistic depictions of a social order coming apart, or fluent, defiant outpourings of praise, Wiman pushes his language and forms until they break open, revealing startling new truths within. The poems are joyful and sorrowful at the same time, abrasive and beautiful, densely physical and credibly mystical. They attest to the human hunger to feel existence, even at its most harrowing, and the power of art to make our most intense experiences not only apprehensible but transfiguring.

Christian Wiman, born and raised in West Texas. He is the editor of Poetry and the author of two previous collections of poems, Hard Night (2005) and The Long Home (2007), and one collection of prose. He lives in Chicago.

Editors Note

Ezra Pound   In a Station of the MetroKay Ryan   Sharks TeethMarie Ponsot   Anti-Romantic Roddy Lumsden   The YoungLeRoi Jones   Valéry as DictatorEdwin Arlington   Robinson Eros TurannosAnge Mlinko   It Was a Bichon Frisés Life . . .Muriel Rukeyser   SongAugust Kleinzahler   The HereafterT. S. Eliot   The Love Song of J. Alfred PrufrockLaura Kasischke   LookWeldon Kees   From “Eight Variations”Robert Creeley   For LoveMary Karr   DisgracelandLucille Clifton   sorrowsA. E. Stallings   On Visiting a Borrowed Country House in ArcadiaCharles Wright   Bedtime StoryDelmore Schwartz   In the Naked Bed, In Platos CaveWilliam Matthews   Mingus at the ShowplaceDonald Justice   Men at FortyRuth Stone   ForecastCraig Arnold   Meditation on a GrapefruitJosephine Miles   The Hampton Institute AlbumP. K. Page   My Chosen LandscapeTheodore Roethke   Florists Root CellarWallace Stevens   Tea at the Palaz of HoonBasil Bunting   From BriggflattsLouise Bogan   NightRodney Jack   After the DiagnosisMargaret Atwood   Pig SongMichael S. Harper   Blues AlabamaIsaac Rosenberg   Break of Day in the TrenchesGeorge Starbuck   Of LateRandall Jarrell   ProtocolsTom Disch   The Prisoners of WarSeamus Heaney   A Dog Was Crying To-Night in Wicklow AlsoHart Crane   At Melvilles TombRobert Hayden   O Daedalus, Fly Away HomeCharles Bukowski   A Not So Good Night in the San Pedro of the WorldAdrienne Rich   Final NotationsW. H. Auden   The Shield of AchillesAlbert Goldbarth   He HasAlice Fulton   What I LikeEdna St. Vincent Millay   RendezvousSylvia Plath   Fever 103Lisel Mueller   In the Thriving SeasonEleanor Wilner   MagnificatAtsuro Riley   HutchThomas Sayers   Ellis Or,Marianne Moore   No Swan So FineJohn Berryman   The TravelerAverill Curdy   Sparrow Trapped in the AirportH. D.   His PresenceRae Armantrout   TransactionsGwendolyn Brooks   The Children of the PoorE. E. Cummings   What If a Much of a Which of a WindFrederick Seidel   Mu‘allaqaGeoffrey Hill   The Peacock of AldertonMay Swenson   Green Red Brown and WhiteAnne Stevenson   Inheriting My Grandmothers NightmareJeanne Murray   Walker Little Blessing for My FloaterBrooklyn Copeland   Prayers EndJack Spicer   “Any fool can get into an ocean . . . ”Alan Dugan   Fabrication of AncestorsEdward Dorn   Dark CeilingW. S. Merwin   Search PartyLorine Niedecker   Three PoemsDenise Levertov   Our BodiesJames Wright   The BlessingRobinson Jeffers   Grass on the CliffW. S. Di Piero   Big City SpeechCid Corman   From “Cahoots”Richard Wilbur   Hamlen BrookRita Dove   Old Folks Home, JerusalemDon Paterson   The LieMaxine Kumin   NurtureWilliam Carlos Williams   Paterson, Book V: The River of HeavenTed Hughes   HeatwaveFrank OHara   Chez JaneReginald Dwayne Betts   “For you: anthophilous, lover of flowers”Rachel Wetzsteon   On Leaving the Bachelorette BrunchAdrian Blevins   How to Cook a WolfA. R. Ammons   Gravelly RunSamuel Menashe   HereRobert Duncan   Returning to Roots of First FeelingLangston Hughes   Blues in StereoJames Schuyler   Korean MumsJacob Saenz   Sweeping the StatesGeorge Oppen   Birthplace: New RochelleGary Snyder   Song of the TangleBelle Randall   A Childs Garden of GodsIsabella Gardner   The Widows YardThom Gunn   Lines for a BookFrank Bidart   From “The Third Hour of the Night”William Meredith   The IlliterateRhina P. Espaillat   ChangelingMaria Hummel   StationJames Merrill   The Mad SceneW. S. Graham   The Beast in the SpaceWilliam Butler Yeats   The Fisherman

Acknowledgments

Contributors