10 Excellent Modern Poetry Books

This is the newest collection from Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Rae Armantrout. The poems in this book explore the ways we make sense of the world in the face of disaster. Using poignant visual and psychological observations, Armantrout also touches on themes of grief, family, and place. 

The word “sukun” means serenity or calm, and a sukun is also an Arabic punctuation mark that denotes a pause. In this book, poet, essayist, and novelist Kazim Ali employs that “pause” to explore identity, migration, love, and culture in a rapidly changing world. This collection includes selected poems from Ali’s past books, as well as 35 new poems that emphasize his signature lyrical and emotive style. 

The poems in Brenda Hillman’s third book all draw from and meditate on nature and the natural world. Hillman accesses deep feelings of grief and loss as she writes about trees, wasps, and stars, leading to a finale focused on two magical spaces for humans: forests and seashores. Hillman’s language in this highly original book is inventive and exceedingly effective at guiding readers.

Idra Novey’s poems are like modern fables that bring readers on a journey around the Americas, from Chile to New York. This collection juxtaposes the realities of raising kids in the concrete jungle of a city with a barefoot and free childhood in the country, connecting two extremes that are often viewed in opposition. These poems draw from Novey’s own personal life to address the broader experience of today’s world. 

Evie Shockley asks readers to ponder how we balance our own journeys with the fact that we always exist in relation to one another. This collection incorporates visual art, including visionary work by Black women like Alison Saar and Alma Thomas, and uses language with the aim of displaying the web of interconnections between everyone and everything on Earth. This book was a finalist for the 2024 National Book Award for Poetry. 

This is the eighth collection from renowned poet Peter Gizzi. Gizzi utilizes the poem not just as an art form but as a way of organizing thoughts and making sense of the world. The poems in this collection are standalone pieces of work connected by repeated phrases and words. Gizzi’s book is extremely personal and touches on themes of joy, loss, and day to day life. 

In the Language of My Captor, winner of the Lannan Literary Award for Poetry, is a commentary on freedom, told through stories of captivity. Shane McCrae uses historical persona poems and prose memoir to dissect the freedom of both Black and white Americans and addresses the complicated connections that mass media, domination, and love have to racism. 

Will Harris draws from his own Anglo-Indonesian heritage in this collection surrounding questions of identity and the self. With multiple kinds of poems, Harris has created a book that makes readers reflect on their own identities and cultural relationships. Harris’s collection is uniquely innovative and emotionally powerful, while still being accessible. 

This fourth award-winning collection of blues poetry by Honoree Fanonne Jeffers compares the blues to the path towards wisdom. Jeffers does not shy away from the treacherous and often hidden aspects of womanhood in her exploration and she draws much from the spirit of her muse, the late poet Lucille Clifton. The poet also addresses race and religion in relation to her seeking of wisdom. 

The poems within Trophic Cascade were written in response to the environmental destruction, violence, and abuses of power in the 21st century. Camille T. Dungy answers the despair she sees in the world with poems about the strength and beauty of nature and our relationships with one another. These pieces represent a commitment to hope, even when it feels like the world has gone awry.