Collected Poems Hardcover – April 4, 2013

What a lovely choice for the Library of America to publish a definitive one volume edition of May Swenson's poetry! I'm not knowledgeable enough to declare where she stands in (or outside) the canon of American poetry. I happened to read a few of her poems in an anthology a few years back (Poems Between Women) and enjoyed them so much I sought out more of her work and have enjoyed every moment spent with her.

Many of Swenson's poems have a light, playful tone. Some express her awe of nature or curiosity about places or events. She covers everything from dental work, science v. religion, falling in love, space shuttles, gardening, sex, time, tides, travel, James Bond movies, children, cats, dreams, you name it. Her love poems can be joyful, sad, erotic or all of these and more. She enjoyed playing with form (by this I mean the literal shape of the text), and this volume has maintained the wildly variegated formatting of some of her poems: lines may criss-cross, run diagonally on the page or be stacked vertically in columns. These mischievous creations become adventures for the eyes as well as for the mind and heart.

The images Swenson creates are clear, easy to grasp, yet often take you by surprise. In almost every poem, no matter the topic, she makes you feel the delight in her own discovery. I don't want to make her sound like a Pollyanna. She explores serious themes as well. But my overall impression is one of a writer embracing with wonder all the mysteries and challenges and absurdities of life. You can open this compact hardcover at any of its 700+ pages and become immediately engaged. This volume, kept on a bedside table or toted to a waiting room, will provide readers of all ages with many hours of escape and enjoyment. Highly recommended!

The "Product Details" in this Amazon listing, which indicate the book is 976 pages long, appear to be incorrect. The hardcover volume I received is 759 pages.

This is an excellent book -- highly recommended.

However, be aware that Hammer omits two strong poems: "Neither Wanting More" (a particularly egregious omission) and "Sleeping with Boa." Both poems were first published posthumously, and both are included in THE COMPLETE LOVE POEMS OF MAY SWENSON (2003). "Neither Wanting More" first appeared in the original release of that book (1991).

Note that "Neither Wanting More" appears in 100 ESSENTIAL MODERN POEMS BY WOMEN (Ivan R. Dee, 2008), edited by Joseph Parisi and Kathleen Welton, and also in LOVE SPEAKS ITS NAME: GAY AND LESBIAN LOVE POEMS (Everyman's Library, 2001), edited by Jay McClatchy. The poem has also been set to music by a number of composers.

The Library of America published this volume of the "Collected Poems" of May Swenson (1913 -- 1989) in commemoration of the 100th anniversary of the poet's birth. The volume includes the seven books of poems Swenson published during her life together with a large selection of uncollected poems. It also includes a short collection of Swenson's essays about poetry. The book preserves Swenson's poetry in an attractive volume and will likely become the definitive edition of her work. Landon Hammer, professor of English at Yale University, edited the volume, which includes as well a valuable chronology of Swenson's life. Hammer also edited the Library of America's volume of Hart Crane's poetry and letters.

Settings of two Swenson poems by the American composer William Bolcom in a recording by soprano Carole Farley with the composer at the piano got me interested in the poet and provide a short introduction to her work. The first, "The Digital Wonder Watch (An Advertisement)" (p. 488 this volume) comes from Swenson's 1987 collection "In other Words" and shows her combination of whimsy, satire and depth. Swenson's satire on technology and advertising comes through in the composer's tick-tock piano setting. While describing the many advanced features of her "wonderful watch" the poet asks, "Does it show how to wind up/a broken heart?"

The second of Swenson's poems "Night Practice" is included in her 1963 collection "To Mix with Time" (p. 152 of this volume). Bolcom set the work as part titled "I will Breathe a Mountain" of poems by American women. The poem captures the experimental, modernistic cast of many of Swenson's poems in which the theme is mirrored by the form of the poem on the page. The poem is written in the form of a pyramid as the poet meditates and tries to come to terms with the inevitability of death. The poem concludes with the line "I will breathe a valley, I will breathe a mountain", which Bolcom adopted as the title of his song cycle.

Swenson was the child of Swedish immigrants who were devout Mormons. She lived until graduating from college in Utah before moving to Greenwich Village where she lived for many years. She lived the Bohemian life of a young artist supporting herself by a variety of jobs until she became established as a poet. Swenson ultimately won a great deal of critical recognition. She received a Guggenheim Fellowship, a MacArthur Grant, and the Bollingen Prize for poetry among other honors. During her life, she had lovers and companions, male and female.

The American poet Elizabeth Bishop greatly influenced Swenson and the two became close friends. Swenson wrote several poems to or about her mentor. As did Bishop, Swenson wrote many fables about animals, such as "The Lion" (p.6). I found that Swenson's work has a teasing quality that moves between fun and seriousness. She has a broad range and writes about animals and nature as well as about city life in for example "Riding the 'A'" (p. 187). She writes about science and its relation to poetry and shows a particular interest in the astronauts and in space exploration. There are poems about Swenson's travels to the American West, to Florida, and to Europe. Many poems are set on the Delaware shore where Swenson lived in the late years of her life. Many of Swenson's poems have an erotic character. After her death, collections made and published of her "love poems" drawing heavily on uncollected works.

The poems are rhythmical and beautifully crafted with detailed, specific observation and a poet's eye and ear for the precise word. Many of the poems are immediately accessible. Swenson is best-known as a modernist for her efforts to integrate form with sense, as is the case in "Night Practice" among many other poems. Swenson used many different shapes in different poems and even varied the font size of the text. This collection captures the experimental character of her work. Probably the most characteristic of Swenson's books is "Iconographs" (1970) in which the form captures the poem in the manner of an iconographic painting.

Swenson wrote of the surfaces of things, but she did so deliberately. She wrote of sight and language for their own sakes to show things afresh and also to make the reader pause and see things in a new way and for oneself. The poems have depth and concern for meaning together with the surface playfulness. The poems are almost all short, but two of the lengthy poems, "Banyan" and "Some Quadrangles, the 1982 Harvard Phi Beta Kappa Poem" capture much of the spirit and purpose of her writing. In an essay, "The Poet as Antispecialist", Swenson explained:

"What is the experience of poetry? Choosing to analyze this experience for myself after an engrossment of many years, I see it based in a craving to get through the curtains of things as they appear to things as they are and then into the larger, wilder space of things as they are becoming. This ambition involves a paradox: an instinctive belief in the senses as exquisite tools for this investigation and, at the same time, a suspicion about their crudeness."

The Library of America deserves thanks for its efforts to celebrate the best of American accomplishment in literature and poetry. May Swenson's poems deserve their place in this celebration. I was pleased to have the opportunity to get to know her writing in this volume of her Collected Poems.

Robin Friedman

I love this author! The book is comprehensive and has many poems I had not seen previously in the other 2 books of poetry of hers that I have

In many ways, Swenson was a poet's poet. Her language sparkles, and her light touch paves the way for powerful surprises. We need more poets, now especially, who love the world as deeply as Swenson did, and write with such vivacity and insight.

This review is for the Kindle edition which is an inferior Kindle product. There is no clickable table of contents, nor search function.

I had never heard of May Swenson before, and then Langdon Hammer (the editor) spoke about her and recited aloud some of her poems. There's one about taking a branch from a tree and pretending it is a horse that she rides, even slapping her rump which is at the same time both her body and the "horse's" flank. Delightful! It's grand to be 69 years old and discover something NEW to read and relish. Andrea Stillman

The most complete book of Swenson's poetry I've ever found. Her shape poems really come to life in this book.