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Immigrant Centuries

These are immigrant times

And the lines are long,

The signs for jobs few,

The songs sadder, the air meaner.

Everyone is hungry.

Everyone is willing.

Jobs are not jobs but lives lived

Hard at the work of being human.

These are immigrant times,

And the lines are long again.

41,493

poems

4,155

poets

207

poetic terms

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01

By feeling

Grief, desire, revolt, wonder. Start where the poem meets your life.

Emotions →
02

By form

Follow the sonnet, ghazal, villanelle, ode, and every shape in between.

The glossary →
03

By constellation

Move between a poet, their influences, peers, translations, and afterlives.

Poets →

Selected

Poems worth returning to

This summer I didn't find time …

Carl Dennis

Tonight I look at you …

W. S. Merwin

Even in fortunate times, …

Timothy Steele

Rain commenced, and wind did. …

Raymond McDaniel

Amid moonscape railings …

Liz Howard

From the thick rock on which it rests …

Ben Howard

I don’t even dig Pound. But in a sunk cemetery in a sinking city …

Megan Fernandes

Puerto Rican leather sits on my shoulders …

Matthew Buchta

The glossary

The language about poetry

From aubade to zuihitsu, 207 definitions of the forms, figures, and schools that shape the line.

Explore the glossary→
Accentual verseAccentual-syllabic verseAcmeismAlcaicAlexandrineAmbiguity