LibGuides: Poetry: Books & Anthologies

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Call Numbers

A call number is like an address for an item in a library. It's a code made up of letters and numbers that helps you find books on the shelves. It groups books by topic to make it easier for you to find what you're looking for.

Poetry

The following are some general call number areas in the field of literature related to poetry. Books with these call numbers are located on the third floor in the STCC Library.

PN 1110-1279	Poetry - History and criticism
PN 6099-6110	Collections of general literature - Poetry
PQ 1160-1193	French poetry
PQ 6174.95-6215	Spanish poetry
PS 301-326	American poetry
PS 580-619	Collections of American poetry

Poetry Anthologies in the STCC Library

This is just a sample of the poetry anthologies you can find in the STCC Library. Anthologies are collections of texts by various authors, often related by theme, literary genre, or geography. Find more by searching the library catalog.

World Poetry by Katharine Washburn (Editor); John S. Major (Editor); Clifton Fadiman
Call Number: PN6101.W517 1998
Publication Date: 2000-11-17
This volume contains more than 1600 poems drawn from dozens of languages and cultures, and spans a period of more than 4000 years from ancient Sumer and Egypt to the late twentieth century.
Norton Anthology of Modern and Contemporary Poetry by Robert O'Clair, Jahan Ramazani, and Richard Ellmann (Editors)
Call Number: PS613.N67 2003 v.1-2
ISBN: 0393977919
A comprehensive collection of twentieth-century poetry in English that represents the major figures, while also giving full voice to ethnic American poetries, experimental traditions, postcolonial poetry, and the long poem.
American Hybrid by Cole Swensen; David St. John (Editor)
Call Number: PS617.A54 2009
Publication Date: 2009-03-30
An anthology of contemporary American poetry that focuses on a synthesis of traditional and experimental styles. The editors have crafted short introductory essays on each of the poets in the anthology, providing biographical backgrounds and positioning them within the current of contemporary poetry.
El Coro: A Chorus of Latino and Latina Poetry by Martin Espada (Editor)
Call Number: PS508.H57 C67 1997
ISBN: 1558491104
This is an anthology of work by Latino and Latina poets, which reveals a diversity of form and content. Among the poets are former farm workers and gang members, a physician, a chef and a Vietnam veteran. The variety of experience demonstrates that there is no single Latinx outlook.
Quiet Fire: A Historical Anthology of Asian American Poetry, 1892-1970 by Juliana Chang
Call Number: PS591.A76.Q54 1996
This landmark anthology provide the first historical survey of Asian American poetry. The poems were selected to reflect both the high quality and wide range of Asian American poetic discourse.
Inclined to Speak: An Anthology of Contemporary Arab American Poetry by Hayan Charara (Editor)
Call Number: PS591.A7.I53 2008
Here are thirty-nine poets offering up 160 poems. Charara has written a lengthy introduction about the state of Arab American poetry in the country today and short biographies of the poets and provided an extensive list of further readings.
¡Manteca!: An Anthology of Afro-Latin@ Poets by Melissa Castillo-Garsow (Editor)
Call Number: PQ7084.M244 2017
Containing the work of more than 40 poets--equally divided between men and women--who self-identify as Afro-Latino, ¡Manteca! is the first poetry anthology to highlight writings by Latinos of African descent. The themes covered are as diverse as the authors themselves.
Angles of Ascent: A Norton Anthology of Contemporary African American Poetry by Charles Henry Rowell (Editor)
Call Number: PS508.N3.A86 2013
A gathering of poems that demonstrate what happens when writers in a marginalized community devote themselves to the art of their poems and to the ideas they embody. These poets bear witness to the interior landscapes of their own individual selves or examine the private or personal worlds of invented personae and, therefore, of human beings living in our modern and postmodern worlds.
The Oxford Book of American Poetry by David Lehman and John Brehm (Editors)
Call Number: PS583.O82 2006
This collection redefines the great canon of American poetry from its origins in the 17th century right up to the present. It is a must-have anthology for anyone interested in American literature.
The Penguin Anthology of 20th-Century American Poetry by Rita Dove (Editor)
Call Number: PS613.P47 2011
ISBN: 9780143106432
Publication Date: 2011-10-25
This collection of modern American poetry features the most significant and compelling work by the most influential voices of the twentieth century.
Wheel and Come Again: An Anthology of Reggae Poetry by Kwame Dawes (Editor)
Call Number: PR9205.6.W43 1998
The beat and language of reggae arose from the Jamaican countryside and the sidewalks of Kingston, but they're basic for the poets represented in Wheel and Come Again. This remains true even though the poets' personal worlds range from the street to the university and from the tropics to Toronto, New York, and London.
No More Masks: An Anthology of Twentieth-Century American Women Poets by Florence Howe (Editor)
Call Number: PS589.N58 1993
A revised and expanded edition of the classic groundbreaking anthology of 20th-century American women's poetry, representing more than 100 poets.

Contemporary Poets

Poetry by some of the most important poets of our time. Find more by searching the library catalog.

Blue Horses by Mary Oliver
Call Number: PS3565.L5.A63 2014
In this stunning collection of new poems, Mary Oliver returns to the imagery that has defined her life's work, describing with wonder both the everyday and the unaffected beauty of nature.
Brown Girl Dreaming by Jacqueline Woodson
Call Number: PS3573.O64524.Z46 2014 (Children's)
Jacqueline Woodson, one of today's finest writers, tells the moving story of her childhood in mesmerizing verse. In vivid poems, she shares what it was like to grow up as an African American in the 1960s and 1970s, living with the remnants of Jim Crow and her growing awareness of the Civil Rights movement.
Chasing Utopia by Nikki Giovanni
Call Number: PS3557.I55.C47 2013
From one of America's most celebrated poets comes this poignant collection of poetry that celebrates the simple pleasures of everyday life and the bonds we share with those closest to us.
Collected Poems 1943-2004 by Richard Wilbur
Call Number: PS3545.I32165.A6 2004
Over the course of his distinguished sixty-year career, Richard Wilbur has written seventeen collections of poetry, four children's books, and numerous works in prose and translations. This comprehensive collection presents Wilbur's poems, including several new and never before published.
The Complete Collected Poems of Maya Angelou by Maya Angelou
Call Number: PS3551.N464.A17 1994
Complete collection of Mary Angelou's published poems, including her inaugural poem "On the Pulse of Morning."
Hard Times Require Furious Dancing by Alice Walker
Call Number: PS3573.A425.H37 2010
This new book of poems was composed over the course of one year in response to joy and sorrow both personal and global: the death of loved ones, war, the deliciousness of love, environmental devastation, the sorrow of rejection, greed, poverty, and the sweetness of home.
Milk and Honey by Rupi Kaur
Call Number: PR9199.4.K377.A6 2015
milk and honey is a collection of poetry and prose about survival. About the experience of violence, abuse, love, loss, and femininity. The book is divided into four chapters, and each chapter serves a different purpose. Deals with a different pain. Heals a different heartache. milk and honey takes readers through a journey of the most bitter moments in life and finds sweetness in them because there is sweetness everywhere if you are just willing to look.
Notes on the Assemblage by Juan Felipe Herrera
Call Number: PS3558.E74.A68 2015
Exuberant and socially engaged, reflective and healing, this collection of new work from the nation's first Latino Poet Laureate is brimming with the wide-open vision and hard-won wisdom of a poet whose life and creative arc have spanned chasms of culture in an endless crossing, dreaming and back again.
On the Bus with Rosa Parks: Poems by Rita Dove
Call Number: PS3554.O884.O52 1999
From the opening sequence, probing the private griefs and dreams of a working class family, to the emblematic grace of the living legend Rosa Parks, these poems explore the intersection of individual fates with the grand arc of history.
The Rose That Grew from Concrete by Tupac Shakur
Call Number: PS3569.H3234.R6 1999
Tupac Shakur's most intimate and honest thoughts were uncovered only after his talent was unbounded, a raw force that commanded attention and respect. Written in his own hand at the age of nineteen, they embrace his spirit, his energy, and his ultimate message of hope.
Selected Poems by James Tate
Call Number: PS3570.A8A6 1991
An award-winning collection by a celebrated poet. According to the Poetry Foundation, "Tate’s poems have been described as tragic, comic, absurdist, ironic, hopeful, haunting, lonely, and surreal."
Time and Materials by Robert Hass
Call Number: PS3558.A725.T56 2007
The poems in this collection are grounded in the beauty and energy of the physical world, and in the bafflement of the present moment in American culture.
The Trouble with Poetry and Other Poems by Billy Collins
Call Number: PS3553.O47478.T76 2005
Playfulness, spare elegance, and wit epitomize the poetry of Billy Collins. With his distinct voice and accessible language, America's two-term Poet Laureate has opened the door to poetry for countless people for whom it might otherwise remain closed.
Warhorses by Yusef Komunyakaa
Call Number: PS3561.O455.W37 2008
This powerful new collection of Yusef Komunyakaa's poetry delves into an age of war and conflict, both global and internal, racial and sexual. Warhorses is the stunning work of a Pulitzer Prize-winning poet.

Historical Poets

Below is just a tiny sampling of works by some of the most famous poets in history. Find more by searching the library catalog.

100 Love Sonnets by Pablo Neruda; Stephen Tapscott (Translator)
Call Number: PQ8097.N4C513 1986
Winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1971, Pablo Neruda is regarded as the greatest Latin American poet of the 20th century. Against the backdrop of Isla Negra - the sea and wind, the white sand with its scattering of delicate wild flowers, the hot sun and salty smells of the Pacific - the poet sets the poems in celebration of his love. The subject of that love is Matilde Urrutia de Neruda, the poet's 'beloved wife'.
The Complete Poems of Emily Dickinson by Emily Dickinson; Thomas H. Johnson (Editor)
Call Number: PS1541.A1 1960
Known for her unique and introspective style, Emily Dickinson wrote poems that explore universal themes such as love, nature, death, and the soul in a personal way. Her poems are known for their unusual metaphors, paradoxes, and ambiguity, leaving readers to ponder and interpret her words.
The Essential Rumi by Coleman Barks; John Moyne (Translator)
Call Number: PK6480.E5.B37 1995
Ecstatic poems of renowned thirteenth century Sufi mystic and spiritual writer Jelalludin Rumi. Back in vogue after all these years, this new translation redefines these timeless poems.
The Poetry and Career of Li Po by Arthur Waley
Call Number: PL2671.W3
A Chinese poet of the Tang Dynasty, Li Po (also known as Li Bai, Li Pai, Li T’ai-po, and Li T’ai-pai) was probably born in central Asia and grew up in Sichuan Province. He left home in 725 to wander through the Yangtze River Valley and write poetry.

Poetry

Poetry Reference Sources

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Call Numbers

Poetry

Poetry Anthologies in the STCC Library

Contemporary Poets

Historical Poets