Poetry

English Lit
Poems
By Bernard Clay

Affrilachian Poet Bernard Clay narrates his West-Side Louisville upbringing and the complexities of Black Appalachian identity in this debut collection of poems compiled from more than twenty years of work.

Flying through a Hole in the Storm
Poems
By Fleda Brown

Award-winning poet Fleda Brown’s thirteenth book examines life and death through a timely, urgent collection of contemplative poems about damage, pain, and loss.

Affrilachia
Poems
By Frank X Walker

This groundbreaking work of Black Appalachian poetry portrays award-winning poet Frank X Walker’s journey growing up “Affrilachian” in rural Kentucky.

Black Box
Poems
By Frank X Walker

In this collection of African American and Appalachian poetry, Frank X Walker continues the brilliant autobiographical journey of Affrilachia, his groundbreaking first volume of poems.

Out of Nowhere
New and Selected Poems
By Mary Ann Taylor-Hall

Out of Nowhere is the first comprehensive collection of poetry by Kentucky writer Mary Ann Taylor-Hall, presenting sixty-six new poems and work from two previous letterpress collections.

Isaac Murphy
I Dedicate This Ride
By Frank X Walker

A new collection of persona poems from award-winning poet Frank X Walker that tell the untold story of legendary African American jockey Isaac Burns Murphy (1861–1896).

A Field Guide to the Poetry of Theodore Roethke
Edited by William Barillas
· Foreword by Edward Hirsch

This timely and accessible companion to the work of twentieth-century American poet Theodore Roethke (1908–1963) gathers essays that illuminate his poetics, themes, and the contexts of his poems through the diverse critical approaches that have emerged in the past five decades.

Black Box
Poems
By Frank X Walker

In this collection of African American and Appalachian poetry, Frank X Walker continues the brilliant autobiographical journey of Affrilachia, his groundbreaking first volume of poems.

Affrilachia
Poems
By Frank X Walker

This groundbreaking work of Black Appalachian poetry portrays award-winning poet Frank X Walker’s journey growing up “Affrilachian” in rural Kentucky.

Out of Nowhere
New and Selected Poems
By Mary Ann Taylor-Hall

Out of Nowhere is the first comprehensive collection of poetry by Kentucky writer Mary Ann Taylor-Hall, presenting sixty-six new poems and work from two previous letterpress collections.

The Audible and the Evident
Poems
By Julie Hanson

The poems in Julie Hanson’s second award-winning book inscribe deep stillness on a world of harmonies in motion, illustrating the movement between and among seasons and tasks, work and leisure, solitude and people, and all through private life as it intersects with the products and noises of industry and nature.

Planted by the Signs
Poems
By Misty Skaggs

Planted by the Signs brings us the contemporary Appalachian poetry of Misty Skaggs. With a knack for pointed personal and social observation, she tells the stories of generations of women who have learned to navigate a harsh world with a little help from the Farmers’ Almanac and the stars: women who know how to plant by the signs.

Intrusive Beauty
Poems
By Joseph J. Capista

In this powerful debut, Capista traverses earth and ether to yield poems that elucidate the space between one’s life and one’s livelihood. While its landscapes range from back-alley Baltimore to the Bitterroot Valley, this book remains close to unbidden beauty and its capacity to sway one’s vision of the world.

Way of All the Earth
By Anna Akhmatova
· Translation by D. M. Thomas

Way of All the Earth contains selected poems written by Anna Akhmatova, one of Russia’s greatest poets whose works embody the complexities of her era. Intricately observed and unwavering in their emotional immediacy, these strikingly modern poems represent one of the twentieth century’s most powerful voices.

Requiem and Poem without a Hero
By Anna Akhmatova
· Translation by D. M. Thomas

With this edition of Requiem and Poem without a Hero, Swallow Press presents two of Anna Akhmatova’s best-known works, ones that represent the poet at full maturity, and that most trenchantly process the trauma she and others experienced living under Stalin’s regime.Akhmatova began the three-decade process of writing Requiem in 1935 after the arrests of her son, Lev Gumilev, and her third husband.

Doubtful Harbor
Poems
By Idris Anderson

In Doubtful Harbor, Idris Anderson turns wandering into art. From large landscapes to the minutest details, she seeks with each poem to convey the world more clearly, acutely, and exquisitely. As she meditates on indelible moments with intimate others, friends, and strangers, she teases from these encounters their elusive connections and disconnections.