[Hardcover]

I find that the Best American Poetry is always enjoyable. Sometimes it is enjoyable because the poems astonish and delight, and sometimes it is enjoyable to hate. 2005 is surprisingly good. What one would identify as the more traditional of poetic virtues are openly on display. While certain of the poems felt gimmicky or cute, there was, running through it, an emotional intelligence and attention to the music of words that's been missing in recent volumes. This isn't surprising when one considers that its editor, Paul Muldoon, is as musically deft as any poet in the language today.

There are offerings from many of the familiars: Ashbery, Simic, Tate, Kinnell. There are also offerings from several of our great dead poets (Ammons, Justice, Bukowski), who somehow continue to be producing quality verse. This seems somewhat unfair, but perhaps poets truly are better off dead. Ammons's poem, where he mentions the flurry of death in his own life alongside other things that happen in bunches (marriages, first children) and Justice's poem about an old fisherman dancing by himself on a dock were possibly the two most moving pieces of work in the volume. Other highlights for me were Matthew Yeager's narrative poem about the huge tinfoil ball in the small city apartment (which my seven year old son also enjoyed) and Stephen Dunn's poem "Five Roses in the Morning."

Overall, I would pick this volume up.

I enjoyed this book immensely. Quality entries from the usual suspects - Ashbery, Simic, Tate, Ammons - are complimented nicely by a slew of entries from lesser known poets. I won't get into each one, but I will discuss one in particular. I was most fond of Matt Yeager's narrative poem about a giant tin foil ball. It possessed a creativity that seems to me to be dwindling in most American art. You're probably saying, "a giant tin foil ball?" Trust me, this is a great work and I can't wait to see more from this young poet.

"Your burglaries leave no thumbprint

Mine, too, are silent

I do my best imagining at night,

And you do yours with the help of shadows.

Like actors rehearsing a play,

The dark ones withdrew

Into remote corners of the room

The rest of us sat in expectation

Of your burning oratory."

~ from Sunlight by Charles Simic

The maturity of the poems in The Best American Poetry 2005 is instantly apparent the moment you read "In View of the Fact" by A.R. Ammons. This is a deeply thoughtful collection of poems best addressed when you are in a contemplative mood. Within the pages there are many surprises, lovely conclusions and especially creative thought patterns. Sexuality and death seem to be themes throughout, but there is also humor and cleverly designed rhymes the wittiest poets must long to master.

"Ants" by Vicki Hudspith is especially comical while Mary Karr's poem about her son is especially heart-warming and leans more towards a serious realization of life's complexity within expectation. Richard Garcia's "Adam and Eve's Dog" lightens a topic most would find quite serious and Edward Field's poem of praise has a beautiful freeing conclusion with metaphorical appeal.

"If I were Japanese I'd write about magnolias

in March, how tonal, each bud long as a pencil,

sheathed in celadon suede, jutting from a cluster

of glossy leaves. I'd end the poem before anything

bloomed, end with rain swelling the buds

and the sheaths bursting, then falling to the grass

like a fairy's castoff slippers, like candy wrappers,

like spent firecrackers."

~ Beth Ann Fennelly, pg. 46

What I am most impressed by in this collection of poems, is the truthfulness and the straightforward invitation into this sincerity. There is a cleverness in the crafting of each idea (I Want to be Your Shoebox) and at times profound lessons can appear through the viewpoint of a poet who sees the world a little more intensely (The Poets March on Washington). Jane Hirshfield's "Burlap Sack" paints an image of bondage and freedom, while Linda Pastan reveals a different type of cultural freedom.

Paul Muldoon's selections also provide a consistent mood and his love for rhyme and complex sentence structures invites you into a world of poems that reveal intricate details of your own life. At times his selections are realistic and edgy with mature considerations and at other times he has selected profound moments to inspire a more heartfelt appreciation for beauty. Both ideas seem to weave together to form a painting of how life is really lived in a realistic setting, as opposed to a more romantic rendering of ideas within a dreamscape of fantasy poems. Now and then, a line in a poem is so highly significant you can read the entire poem and then suddenly awaken upon a stunning moment.

"Wanting the tight buds of my loneliness

to swell and split, not die in wanting.

It was why I rushed through everything,

why I tore away at the perpetual gauze

between me and the stinging world"

~ pg. 133, Chase Twichell

I can also highly recommend the 2006 edition of The Best American Poetry, which is enhanced with pop culture references and a distinctly contemporary mood. As with all the books edited by David Lehman, the "Foreword" is well worth reading. David Lehman's experience in the world of poetry reveals ideas that will be of great interest to anyone interested in poetry culture.

~The Rebecca Review

› Go to Amazon.com to see all 3 reviews  4.3 out of 5 stars