Preface • EMILY DICKINSON (1830-1886) • Nancy Willard: Questioning the Pilgrim • Charles Simic: Ambiguity’s Wedding • David Walker: Stinging Work • Stanley Plumly: Doors Ajar • Martha Collins: The Outer from the Inner • David Young: Electric Moccasins • GERARD MANLEY HOPKINS (1844-1889) • Charles Wright: Improvisations: With Father Hopkins on Lake Como • Gerald Stern: Some Thoughts • David Young: Surprised by Grief • Lee Upton: “Disremembering, Dismembering” • Dennis Schmitz: On “Carrion Comfort” • Stanley Plumply: “Hear What I Do” • Marianne Boruch: Becoming “Epithalamion” • WALLACE STEVENS (1879-1955) • Dennis Schmitz: On “Peter Quince at the Clavier” • Philip Booth: On “Domination of Black” • Alberta Turner: Astonished • Laura Jensen: Why I like “The Snow Man” • Maxine Kumin: On “A Postcard from the Volcano” • David Young: Gaiety of Language • Shirley Kaufman: On “A Rabbit as King of the Ghosts” • William Stafford: On “Poetry Is a Destructive Force” • Albert Goldbarth: On “The Glass of Water” • Stanley Plumly: “ The Class of Water”: A Footnote • Pamela Stewart: On Stevens’ “Yellow Afternoon” • Marvin Bell: On “Arrival at the Waldorf” • David Walker: On “Puella Parvula” • WILLIAM CARLOS WILLIAMS (1883-1963) • Donald Justice: On Purity of Style • Marvin Bell: Williams and “Dedication...” • Marcia Southwick: On “Dedication for a Plot of Ground” • Donald Hall: William Carlos Williams and the Visual • David Walker: On “The Polar Bear” • Miroslav Holub: W.C. Williams on Death • Charles Simic: Streets Strewn with Garbage • Gerald Stern: On “Canthara” • Stanley Plumly: Reading Williams • Paul Mariani: An April of Small Waves • EZRA POUND (1885-1972) • Donald Hall: Pound’s Sounds • William MAtthews: Young Ezra • Stanley Plumly: Pound’s Garden • James Laughlin: Rambling Around Pound’s Propertius • Norman Dubie: Some Notes: Into the Sere and Yellow • Carol Muske: Alba LXXIX • Charles Wright: Improvisations on Pound • MARIANNE MOORE (1887-1972) • Lynne McMahon: On “The Steeple-Jack” • David Walker: Imperial Happiness • Barbara Molloy-Olund: Man—Sea—Silence • Stanley Plumly: Absent Things • Lee Upton: An Invitation to Wonder • David Young: Clipped Wings • ANNA AKHMATOVA (1889-1966) • Lenore Mayhew: Images from a Life • Alberta Turner: Translating the Translations • Marcia Southwick: A Slab of Clay, a Handful of Dust • Judith Hemschemeyer: A Poet and Her Country • Deborah Digges: Translation and the Egg • David Young: Mending What Can’t Be Mended • Marilyn Krysl • The Leper’s Battle • OSIP MANDELSTAM (1892-1941) • Franz Wright: Persephone’s Bees: Thoughts on Mandelstam • Agha Shahid Ali: The Blessed Word • David young: Stars Versus Salt • Silvia Fischerová: The Time vs. the Age • Martha Collins: the Speech of Silence Laboring • Robert Bly: The Beauty of Sound • EUGENIO MONTALE (1896-1981) • Sandra McPherson: On “In the Greenhouse” • Jerome Mazzaro: “The Custom-House” and “Lemons” • David St. John: Eugenio Montale’s “Two in Twilight” • Dana Gioia: From Pastoral to Apocalypse in Mid-Sentence • James Merrill: On “Mottetti VII” • Sonia Raiziss: Montale’s “Dream” Poem • David Young: The Poem That Took the Place of a Mountain • Reg Saner: Montale and the Outsider • Charles Wright: Improvisations on Montale • ROBERT FRANCIS (1901-1987) • David Young: Robert Francis and the Bluejay • Donald Hall: On “His Running My Running” • Robert Wallace: The Excellence of “Excellence” • Alberta Turner: Permitting Craft • Richard Wilbur: On Robert Francis’ “Sheep” • David Walker: Francis Reading and Reading Francis • PABLO NERUDA (1904-1973) • Marianne Boruch: The Shape of His Melancholy • David Young: The Wave That Does Not Die • David St. John: Pablo Neruda’s “Walking Around” • Robert Bly: Walking Around with Pablo Neruda • William O’Daly: To the Earth and Its Winter • THEODORE ROETHKE (1908-1963) • Marianne Boruch: Three Spirits • Thomas Lux: The Secret Joinery of Song • Alberta Turner: A Second Reading • Martha Collins: Word-Work • Gerald Stern: More Major • Beckian Fritz Goldberg: The Case of “The Tree, the Bird” • ELIZABETH BISHOP (1911-1979) • Sandra McPherson: “The Armadillo”: A Commentary • David Walker: Elizabeth Bishop and the Ordinary • Elizabeth Spires: Questions of Knowledge • Marianne Boruch: Original Shell • Sherod Santos: A Connoisseur of Loneliness • J. D. McClatchy: Some Notes on “One Art” • Alberta Turner: On “First Death in Nova Scotia” • Jean Valentine: On “Sonnet” • ROBERT HAYDEN (1913-1980) • Alberta Turner: On “Those Winter Sundays” • Niccolò N. Donzella: Elegy for an American • W. D. Snodgrass: Robert Hayden: The Man in the Middle • Calvin Hernton: Shining • Anthony Walton: The Eye of Faith • Yusef Komunyakaa: Journey into “(American Journal)” • RANDALL JARRELL (1914-1965) • Laura Jensen: Potential for Whole Totem • Bruce Weigl: An Autobiography of Nightmare • C. D. Wright: Mission of the Surviving Gunner • Fred Chappell: The Longing to Belong • David St. John: Randall Jarrell’s “Seele im Raum” • Ralph Burns: The Plain Truth in “The Truth” • David Young: Day for Night • Nancy Willard: Radiant Facts • Marianne Boruch: Rhetoric and Mystery • David Walker: The Shape on the Bed • WILLIAM STAFFORD (1914-1993) • Charles Simic: On “At the Bomb Testing Site” • Henry Taylor: Millions of Intricate Moves • Jonathan Holden: On “With Kit, Age 7, at the Beach” • Margaret Atwood: On “Waking at 3 A.M.” • Linda Pastan: “On “Ask Me” • Tom Andrews: Glimpses into Something Ever Larger • Alberta Turner: On “Things I Learned Last Week” • David Young: Shivers of Summer Wind • MIROSLAV HOLUB (1923-1998) • Edward Hirsch: Surveyor of Worlds • Larry Levis: So That: On Holub’s “Meeting Ezra Pound” • Dennis Schmitz: Distancing • Sylva Fischerová: A Game with Faces • Tom Andrews: Lives of a Cell • W. S. MERWIN (b. 1927) • Bruce Beasley: The Anti-Catechism of W. S. Merwin • David Walker: W. S. Merwin as Dramatist • C. D. Wright: Echo Rising • James Baker Hall: If There Is a Place Where Is the Language • David Young: Caught Breath• Christopher Merrill: In Search of the Genuine • William Matthews: Layered Vision • Carol Muske: The Transparent Mask • Notes on Contributors • Acknowledgments • Index