Hey, what are you going to do?
It’s an anthology. The problem with every anthology is that it’s not going to please everybody all the time, which means it kind of ultimately pleases nobody, right?
Garrison Keillor, for all his lake business, does a decent job of selecting poetry. Really. This book and its precursor, Good Poems, are both filled with some really excellent material. The biggest downfall, for me personally, is the inclusion of super-traditional stuff, Bible verses, for example. And I'm not a fan of reading portions of something. I know Leaves of Grass is impossibly long, but...I don't know. I'm not an excerpt guy. But hey, it's all about balance, and if the world has to read, say, Robert Frost yet again in order to be tricked into reading Denver Butson, then so be it.
I figure the most useful thing would be to list some of the poems I liked best. This isn't a list of what I consider every good poem in the book, because a very large number are very good. They're just poems that held my attention for whatever reason. I tend to enjoy poems with concrete, real details and story as opposed to language poetry. It’s all pretty accessible stuff, stuff you could probably read without being left with that all-too-familiar poetry feeling of “Well what the hell does that mean?” If that’s you, consider taking a look at some of these.
“For My Daughter in Reply to a Question” –David Ignatow (13)
“Starting the Subaru at Five Below” by Stewart Kestenbaum (15)
“The State of the Economy” by Louis Jenkins (27)
“Calling him back from layoff” by Bob Hicok (43)
“Working in the Rain” by Robert Morgan (45)
“Why I Take Good Care of My Macintosh” by Gary Snyder (79)
“Mother, In Love at Sixty” by Susanna Styve (166)
“My Husband Discovers Poetry” by Diane Lockward (182)
“Soda Crackers” by Raymond Carver (232)
“Driving to Town Late to Mail a Letter” by Robert Bly (253)
“My Brother” by Denver Butson (255)
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