For Introduction to Poetry, Introduction to Literature and Creative Writing courses. Breaking barriers and cultivating a lifelong love of poetry, this practical guide to reading poetry is set up to provide a background in analyzing poems, and applying literary theory. The text also offers approaches to discussing and writing about poetry, in addition to teaching students how a writer works so that they can feel more comfortable reading poems.

Table of Contents:
1. Survivalist Poetics. Green Chile, Jimmy Santiago Baca. Lying in a Hammock at William Duffy's Farm in Pine Island, Minnesota, James Wright. 2. How Readers Work, How Writers Work. Oranges, Gary Soto. Cups of Jade, Huang Pien. Axe Handles, Gary Snyder. March Walk, Jim Harrison. 3. Literary Criticism: Critical Approaches to Meeting a Poem. Marks, Linda Pastan. What Work Is, Philip Levine. Blink Your Eyes, Sekou Sundiata. Poems for the Young White Man ..., Lorna Dee Cervantes. 4. How a Poem Is Built; Metaphor, Symbol, and Point of View. Harlem (A Dream Deferred), Langston Hughes. a woman is not a potted plant, Alice Walker. Traveling Through the Dark, William Stafford. Those Winter Sundays, Robert Hayden. 5. Sound and the Poem: Can You Hear It? Woodchucks, Maxine Kumin. The Crabs, Richmond Lattimore. My Papa's Waltz, Theodore Roethke. 6. Fixed Forms: Shaping the Currents of Poetry. From Ten Sonnets, Sir Thomas Wyatt. The Funeral, Donald Hall. One Art, Elizabeth Bishop. From Narrow Road to the Interior (two haiku Matsuo Basho. School's Ugliest Girl Dies, Albert Garcia. 7. Reading a Poem: From Page to Mouth to Ear. Homage to My Hips, Lucille Clifton. No Longer Mourn for Me, William Shakespeare. A Poem for "Magic," Guincy Troupe. 8. Writers on Writing: Some Thoughts about Poetry. 9. Poems for Further Reading. Snow-Flakes, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. The Passionate Shepherd to His Love, Christopher Marlowe. The Pasture, Robert Frost. Birches, Robert Frost. Because I Could Not Stop for Death, Emily Dickinson. I Think I Could Turn and Live with Animals, Walt Whitman. Man and Dog on an Early Winter Morning, Carl Sandburg. Killers, Carl Sandburg. A Woman, Gabriela Mistral. Time Does Not Bring Relief; You All Have Lied, Edna St. Vincent Millay. Sonnet 14If thou must love me ..., Elizabeth Barrett Browning. In Which She Satisfies a Fear with the Rhetoric of Tears, Sor Juana Ines de la Cruz. Manley Hot Springs, Alaska, 1975, Lisa Chavez. Daystar, Rita Dove. Crossing the Water, Sylvia Plath. The Colonel, Carolyn Forche. The Movies, Florence Kiper Frank. Vandal's Moon, Virgil Suarez. Remember, Joy Harjo. Uncertain Admission, Frances Bazil. Spring and All, William Carlos Williams. A Blessing, James Wright. Song, Laetetia Elizabeth Landon. The Dreaming Child, Felicia Dorothea Hemans. To the Nightingale, Anne Finch, Countess of Winchilsea. To Tranquility, Charlotte Smith. Evening, Charlotte Smith. Verses Written in a Garden, Lady Mary Wortley Montague. Annabel Lee, Edgar Allen Poe. To My Dear and Loving Husband, Anne Bradstreet. Sonnet 29:When in Disgrace with Fortune and Men's Eyes, William Shakespeare. On Being Brought From Africa to America, Phillis Wheatley. Sonnets from the Portuguese: Number 43, Elizabeth Barrett Browning. She's Free, Frances E. Harper. The Poplar Field, William Cowper. Dover Beach, Matthew Arnold. A Psalm of Life, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.Ozymandias, Percy Bysshe Shelley. Mide Songs, Frances Densmore. My Love Has Departed, Love Song, Song on Applying War Paint, Song After Battle, Frances Densmore. Yuman and Yaqui Songs, Frances Densmore. The City Dead House, Walt Whitman. The Fiddler of Dooney, W. B. Yeats. The Tavern, Edwin Arlington Robinson,A Deposition from Love, Thomas Carew.The Song of the Foot-Track, Elsie Cole. Cradle Song, Louise Esson. Homesick, Dorothy Frances McCrae. The New Life, Witter Bynner. A Winter Ride, Amy Lowell. Credits. Glossary.