I confess to enjoying Diane Seuss’ Modern Poetry more in the overall voice, theme, and individual lines versus the collection or entire poems as a whole (with some exceptions). The poems, as one might intuit from the title, often are referential to a stream of poets and writers such as O’Hara and Collette, with Keats playing a larger role than some. The works also reference specific poems, as well as the speaker’s experience in coming to the literary works via two paths: one is the academic (this generally does not come off well) and the other is via a more personal route, one outside the staid, constraining, patriarchal ivy-covered quarters of academia. The voice varies between questioning and fierce, but is almost always confident in tone even while posing questions, such as of poetry’s utility. The speakers are often blunt, forthright, matter-of-fact, for the most part eschewing lyricism (though Seuss often makes good use of sound and rhyme) or glossy metaphor/simile as it navigates a path between the lush gloss of the Romantics and the overused language of modernity, such as its use of “trauma” which has left the word almost meaningless. While as noted, many of the poems, while well crafted, didn’t hit for me personally (is there a more subjective genre than poetry?), Seuss’s voice kept me going, as did coming across singular lines/phrases such as:
“The casket just a drawerful of bones”
“I want to be rich and lithe. Rich, with a lyric gift and a song like a whitethroated sparrow. I am vultureheavy.”
“The song choices were limited, so the grooves were dug deep”

After reading "Frank: Sonnets", I was eager to read more poetry by Diane Suess and this one was even better! There's an air of aloofness but the kind that actually takes a lot of awareness to pull off. These poems are explorative and critical of the different schools of poetry with a touch of self-depreciation that I found delightful and fund to read. Diane Suess is a modern poet indeed.

Diane Seuss is a modern master. I truly loved getting the opportunity to read this collection! Thank you for the advance reader's copy; I look forward to buying my own to add to my permanent collection.

WEDNESDAYS WITH DENISE: March 6, 2024

If only I’d had Diane Seuss’s Modern Poetry when I first encountered the bulky textbook by the same title! If only we all had Diane Suess back then—we might have been a little less scared of verse and how to engage with it. Luckily we have her now! Modern Poetry (Graywolf Press, published today) is a gorgeous undertaking. While delving into issues of gender and class and who poetry is meant for, Suess acknowledges her deep love (and sometimes distrust) of it. Here she is channeling Marianne Moore in “Against Poetry”:

https://yalereview.org/article/diane-seuss-against-poetry

Congratulations, Diane

Thanks to NetGalley, Grawywolf Press, and Diane Seuss for providing me an eARC!

I am always amazed and inspired by Diane's poetry. I was introduced to her poetry not too long ago when I read FRANK: SONNETS. And, I fell in love with the way she tells stories. I usually read before going to bed, and this book was a great read before bedtime. I was enchanted, once again, by the poems in this new collection. I can't wait for her next collection!

The poems I love in Modern Poetry I love very much, and these tend to be the poems that are the most outwardly musical. The first poem in the book, “Little Fugue State,” is phenomenal in its use of rhyme and sound repetition to create a kind of fugal texture. “Bluish” is another favorite for similar reasons. If nothing else I am thankful to have read the book for those two poems which are gems. Many of the longer poems in the book just didn’t resonate with me and I’m not entirely sure why; for that reason I have a feeling I may revisit this one sometime in the future. Still, I’m looking forward to reading more of Seuss’s work.

I enjoyed reading Modern Poetry by Diane Suess, as I have enjoyed her earlier works. I felt as though she had similar experiences to me as a reader, one who both loves the works she encountered in her early years and also wants to grapple with those authors who were underrepresented.

Thanks to the publisher and NetGalley for an eARC.

Reading a new book by Diane Seuss is always a pleasure and inspiration. Each of her books is a different journey, whether through sonnets, or in this case, a study of modern poetry through poems that share the discovery of poets such as Keats, Plath, and others. The poems are her memoir, of her becoming a poet, and trying to figure out what that means. As she says, she won't talk about the light that day because there is too much of that in poetry already. This is a book I will dip into again and again. Reading the book from start to finish allowed me to follow certain motifs and themes that kept appearing. Ending the book with a poem about Keats' Nightingale is genius. Why do poets keep going? Read that last poem in the book.

Diane Seuss' Modern Poetry exhibits poetic moments from the past, with a lot of modernism and deeper meanings. Thanks you to Graywolf Press and NetGalley for giving me a opportunity to read these collection of poems in order to do a review.

Diane Seuss is back and better than ever. Her trademark vulnerability and deceptive simplicity are stronger than ever in this new collection, that, among other things reckons with poetry's past and its potential future.

I will admit that I have grown skeptical of critiques of the "canon" which I often find reductive, repetitive, and devoid of real attention to the work one means to critique. However, that is not at all the case here. Suess brings questions of class and gender to the forefront here while still managing to interact with the poets of the past in a way that feels like a real dialogue. It also helps that her insights are often hilarious. Her invocation of Keats is especially moving and the last poem in the book, which takes after his Ode to the Nightingale, is a personal favorite.