First Loves: Poets Introduce the Essential Poems that Capitivated and Inspired ThemWhen Carmela Ciuraru asked her favorite poets to write about the poems that first inspired them, she was astonished by the illuminating responses she received. In turn, readers will be delighted by the intimate reflections on life and poetry found in First Loves.Affording close-up views of today's best poets, the book also (re)introduces readers to the timeless poems they selected. Sherman Alexie writes about recognizing the constant threat of violence on his reservation when he read Roethke's "My Papa's Waltz". It was a poem by her father that taught Virginia Hamilton Adair about the joys of poetry and the hidden life of her parent. J. D. McClatchy tells of first reading Homer by candlelight while eating a bowl of applesauce. Featuring many Pulitzer Prize and National Book Award winners, the book includes essays by Seamus Heaney, Robert Pinsky, Jorie Graham, Yusef Komunyakaa, and many others.Just in time for National Poetry Month, First Loves is a testament to poetry's matchless abilityto restore faith, offer salvation and solidarity, and above all, alter the course of human life. |
From inside the book
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Page 28
I was in my junior year at the University of Arizona then , and just beginning to fully appreciate the beauty and power of poetry . But it was only when I heard him read that poem , and later , when I read it myself , that I knew how ...
I was in my junior year at the University of Arizona then , and just beginning to fully appreciate the beauty and power of poetry . But it was only when I heard him read that poem , and later , when I read it myself , that I knew how ...
Page 91
I loved that startling plunge from line ending to line beginning , the powerfully physical way “ upreared ” —placed at the start of the line like that enacted , dramatized its own meaning . It made that fearful peak loom over my mind so ...
I loved that startling plunge from line ending to line beginning , the powerfully physical way “ upreared ” —placed at the start of the line like that enacted , dramatized its own meaning . It made that fearful peak loom over my mind so ...
Page 137
Just from the first line , though , something about the poem was mine — and from the last line , as well ; I really only knew the beginning of that poem and the end— “ If Winter comes , can Spring be far behind ?
Just from the first line , though , something about the poem was mine — and from the last line , as well ; I really only knew the beginning of that poem and the end— “ If Winter comes , can Spring be far behind ?
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Contents
Acknowledgments | 11 |
Introduction by Carmela Ciuraru | 19 |
Virginia Hamilton Adair on Along the Road by Robert | 25 |
Copyright | |
19 other sections not shown
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First Loves: Poets Introduce the Essential Poems That Captivated and ... Carmela Ciuraru Limited preview - 2001 |
Common terms and phrases
American beauty become beginning blood Blow body books of poetry born called child City close Collected coming Copyright course dark dead death deep desire dream early English eyes face fall father feel felt Galway green hand head hear heard heart Hilda Doolittle human imagination kind knew language later learned leaves light lines listen lives look meaning memorized mind moon mother move nature never night once Oscar Hammerstein II Perhaps permission poem poet poetry published reader remember Reprinted rhymes Robert round seemed sense singing sleep song soul sound stand Stevens teaches tell things thou thought touch trees turn University verse voice wind write written young
Bibliographic information
| Title | First Loves: Poets Introduce the Essential Poems that Capitivated and Inspired Them |
| Editor | Carmela Ciuraru |
| Edition | illustrated |
| Publisher | Scribner, 2000 |
| Original from | the University of California |
| Digitized | 1 Apr 2008 |
| ISBN | 068486438X, 9780684864389 |
| Length | 268 pages |
| Subjects | › Literary Criticism / Poetry |
| Export Citation | BiBTeX EndNote RefMan |