What do you think?
Rate this book
Super Gay Poems: LGBTQIA+ Poetry After Stonewall
A major poet and literary critic leads an aesthetic adventure through poems about queer experience, by writers who identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, queer, trans, nonbinary, gender fluid, and more.
A groundbreaking anthology edited by acclaimed poet, critic, and scholar Stephanie Burt, Super Gay Poems brings together fifty-one works encompassing the evolutions of queer and trans verse after the Stonewall uprising of 1969. Since that galvanizing moment, poetry has served as both a vehicle for queer liberation and a witness to its sometimes fragile, sometimes ebullient flourishing, across the world.
The poems in this anthology represent the great variety of queer and trans life itself. They include near-sonnets, iambic couplets, and rhymed quatrains; skinny dimeters and shaped poems; chatty free verse and intentionally inaccurate translations; the demotic and the rococo. Arranged in chronological order, the selections trace queer culture’s recent evolutions. Frank O’Hara, Audre Lorde, Judy Grahn, James Merrill, Thom Gunn, Jackie Kay, Adrienne Rich, Chen Chen, essa ranapiri, and The Cyborg Jillian Weise—poets widely known and poets who deserve to be—share their alienation, their euphoria, and their encounters with a protean community as it discovers new solidarities and new selves.
Each piece is paired with a concise, eye-opening essay in Burt’s trademark style, with verve and an inimitable literary ear. A treasury of aesthetic experience and insight, Super Gay Poems points protestors, political organizers, poetry lovers, and LGBTQIA+ readers toward many beautiful tomorrows.
A groundbreaking anthology edited by acclaimed poet, critic, and scholar Stephanie Burt, Super Gay Poems brings together fifty-one works encompassing the evolutions of queer and trans verse after the Stonewall uprising of 1969. Since that galvanizing moment, poetry has served as both a vehicle for queer liberation and a witness to its sometimes fragile, sometimes ebullient flourishing, across the world.
The poems in this anthology represent the great variety of queer and trans life itself. They include near-sonnets, iambic couplets, and rhymed quatrains; skinny dimeters and shaped poems; chatty free verse and intentionally inaccurate translations; the demotic and the rococo. Arranged in chronological order, the selections trace queer culture’s recent evolutions. Frank O’Hara, Audre Lorde, Judy Grahn, James Merrill, Thom Gunn, Jackie Kay, Adrienne Rich, Chen Chen, essa ranapiri, and The Cyborg Jillian Weise—poets widely known and poets who deserve to be—share their alienation, their euphoria, and their encounters with a protean community as it discovers new solidarities and new selves.
Each piece is paired with a concise, eye-opening essay in Burt’s trademark style, with verve and an inimitable literary ear. A treasury of aesthetic experience and insight, Super Gay Poems points protestors, political organizers, poetry lovers, and LGBTQIA+ readers toward many beautiful tomorrows.
368 pages, Hardcover
Published April 1, 2025
71 people are currently reading
4266 people want to read
About the author
Stephanie Burt
66 books81 followersStephanie Burt is the author of fourteen books of poetry and literary criticism, including Super Gay Poems and Don’t Read Poetry. A past judge for the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry, she served as a board member of the National Book Critics Circle, is the recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship, and writes regularly for the New York Times Book Review, the New Yorker, London Review of Books, the New York Review of Books, Raritan, and other publications. She is the Donald P. and Katherine B. Loker Professor of English at Harvard University.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 18 of 18 reviews
![Profile Image for s.penkevich [hiatus-will return-miss you all].](/_next/image?url=https%3A%2F%2Fi.gr-assets.com%2Fimages%2FS%2Fcompressed.photo.goodreads.com%2Fusers%2F1735525095i%2F6431467._UX200_CR0%2C11%2C200%2C200_.jpg&w=128&q=75)
June 6, 2025
A good anthology can unlock doors and welcome readers into a glorious realm of ideas and art illuminated by a choir of voices. With a title like Super Gay Poems: LGBTQIA+ Poetry After Stonewall, how could I resist? I’m glad I didn’t because this was such a vibrant and valuable antholoy. Poet and Harvard professor Stephanie Burt collects a wonderfully diverse selection of 51 poets and poems for a moving and validating examination of queer life in its many forms. Super Gay Poems is ‘the book I wish I could have seen when I was a baby trans,’ Burt writes in her introduction, discussing the importance of books like this that could have been a lifeline when she was ‘trying to figure out whether—if ever—I could come out myself.’ Such visibility is important, especially considering the rampant aggression and increased legislation against queer folks such as the recent UK supreme court decision ruling against trans identities that make it difficult to come out and fearful to simply exist. But poets such as these here—presenting poems published post-Stonewall in 1969 that mix well loved names such as Audre Lorde, Frank O'Hara, Jackie Kay, or Frank Bidart with more recent poets like Jericho Brown, Chen Chen, Essa May Ranapiri, Jee Leong Koh, and many more—demonstrate a multitude of queer, joy, aspirations, and lives that can help others feel less alone and proud to identify with their sexuality. ‘Her visibility meant the world to me,’ Elliot Page wrote about having a queer role model in his memoir Pageboy, ‘I think about this as I walk through the world now.’ And so Super Gay Poems is a wonderous publication, delivering poems each followed by short essays on the poet and their works by Burt making for ‘a book of collective self-representation as well as a book of indissolubly individual works’ that will forever hold a special place on my bookshelf.
Queer
—Frank Bidart
Lie to yourself about this and you will
forever lie about everything.
Everybody already knows everything
so you can
lie to them. That's what they want.
But lie to yourself, what you will
lose is yourself. Then you
turn into them.
*
For each gay kid whose adolescence
was America in the forties or fifties
the primary, the crucial
scenario
forever is coming out—
or not. Or not. Or not. Or not. Or not.
*
Involuted velleities of self-erasure.
*
Quickly after my parents
died, I came out. Foundational narrative
designed to confer existence.
If I had managed to come out to my
mother, she would have blamed not
me, but herself.
The door through which you were shoved out
into the light
was self-loathing and terror.
*
Thank you, terror!
You learned early that adults' genteel
fantasies about human life
were not, for you, life. You think sex
is a knife
driven into you to teach you that.
Activist and queer historial Carlie Pendleton once wrote ‘to queer, as a verb, means to disrupt, to defy the binary.’ Each poem in this collection highlight a disruption to the cis, heteronormative society, ‘measuring each other’s spirit, each other’s / limitless desire, / a whole new poetry beginning here,’ as Adrienne Rich wrote in Transcendental Etude and each poet is valiantly giving voice and making room for the queer community. In her introduction, Burt calls upon the words of academic literary critic Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick explaining that queerness is ‘what happens when the expectations we get from the straight world don’t line up with our lives,’ and these poems celebrate how ‘those mismatches make us.’ There is a wonderful variety of poetic voices and identities though even Burt admits she wished it were a bit more varied, yet still this makes for a great anthology. Especially with Burt’s beautifully written and insightful essays that ask us to look at each poem and walks us through examining all the working parts to better understand what is being said. I was thrilled to see a few non-binary and pan/bisexual poems—like the one by Hera Lindsay Bird—represented, which is my own identity. We have poems about coming out or poems about how ‘most of what is happening is hidden,’ as May Sarton wrote, we have poems of grief, yearning, joy and more. We especially are treated to poems about liberation and desire, such as Frank O'Hara’s closing lines: ‘It’s a summer day, / and I want to be wanted more than anything else in the world.’ Girl, same.
She Ties My Bow Tie
—Gabrielle Calvocoressi
What you thought was the sound of the deer drinking
at the base of the ravine was not their soft tongues
entering the water but my Love tying my bow tie.
We were in our little house just up from the ravine.
Forgive yourself. It’s easy to mistake her wrists
for the necks of deer. Her fingers move so deftly.
One could call them skittish, though not really because
they aren’t afraid of you. I know. You thought it was the deer
but they’re so far down you couldn’t possibly hear them.
No, this is the breeze my Love makes when she ties me up
and sends me out into the world. Her breath
pulled taut and held until she’s through. I watch her
in the mirror, not even looking at me. She’s so focused
on the knot and how to loop the silk into a bow.
There are so many lovely poems here and it is such a riotous celebration of the self. I’m reminded of the above poet, Calvocoressi, who wrote in At Last the New Arriving —a poem not present here but worth reading anyhow—‘Dance until your bones clatter. What a prize / you are. What a lucky sack of stars.’ I think it is important to offer such positive visibility, to help those who live in fear find comfort in belonging, to help those steeped in shame to embrace themselves instead. In the poem Summer , poet Chen Chen (who’s debut collection When I Grow Up I Want to Be a List of Further Possibilities was very inspiring and instrumental in my own coming out as nonbinary and pansexual after going back into hiding after leaving the safety of my University community) discusses how a visible queer community can be a life saver:
‘Reporters & fathers call your generation “the worst.”
Which really means “queer kids who could go online & learn that queer doesn’t have to mean disaster.”
Or dead.
Instead, queer means, splendiferously, you.’
Chen Chen reminds readers that you can tell those who shamed you, such as his own father, ‘you were wrong to say that I had to change. / To make me promise I would.’ It is a really empowering moment. Coming out is a big part of this collection, such as in the wonderfully titled poem So Your GF Wants to Come Out as Bi and Polyamorous to Her Very Conservative Family by The Cyborg Jillian Weise that ends as such:
I am writing this
to the later-in-life
queer women.
you cannot do it
wrong. There’s
no wrong way
to do it. Come out
any way you want.
Come out alive.
It can be a terrifying experience coming out, and a dangerous one. In the United States, queer teens are 120% more likely to experience homelessness with 40% of the 4.2 million unhoused youth identifying as LGBTQ+ compared to 10% of the total population. Queer people without a support system are also four times more likely to attempt suicide and there is an alarmingly growing violence against all queer identities but especially trans women. The rates are significantly increased for BIPOC individuals identifying as LGBTQ+. It is why support is so direly necessary. ‘I take your hand beside the compost heap / glad to be alive and still / with you’ write the great Audre Lorde in Walking Our Boundaries . Take comfort, find a community, find support, stay alive. You are worth it.
‘My name is Slow and Stumbling. I come from planet
Trouble. I am here to love you uncomfortable.’
—Jericho Brown, from Heart Condition
There are also poems about the struggles of having to hide ones identity or love and the troubles with an unwelcoming society. How often heterosexual couples take for granted being able to be open, or even be legally together in certain countries, not worrying ‘she should be / getting home’ as Kay Ryan writes in The First of Never tapping into the anxiety of getting caught, stealing tiny spaces of time because ‘that’s the / only kind / of time / we’ve ever known.’ Other poets address the haters with more of a pushback, as Judy Grahn quips:
‘she has taken a woman lover
whatever shall we do
she has taken a woman lover
how lucky it wasn’t you’
There is a lovely diversity of voices present, such as the poem from Roque Salas Rivera presented in Spanish and English, or poem addressing the intersections of marginalized identities and colonialism. ‘Before Empire’s letters spelled out homo / you tired saris and danced launda ke naach’ says Rajiv Mohabir in Indo-Queer I , ‘Now the white Christian wants to bind you down / in his cellar, horny to tear your throat open.’ Poetry serves us as a tool to lean into cultural histories or roles in a path to ‘become authentic, and to push back against a white, Anglo monoculture that would erase who they are and who they might be,’ Burt writes, commenting on how Moghabir is ‘embodying queerness’ in ways that an ‘upbringing in the United States tried to hide or deny.’ It all makes for a very powerful read.
Twenty-One Love Poems, XIII
——Adrienne Rich
The rules break like a thermometer,
quicksilver spills across the charted systems,
we’re out in a country that has no language
no laws, we’re chasing the raven and the wren
through gorges unexplored since dawn
whatever we do together is pure invention
the maps they gave us were out of date
by years… we’re driving through the desert
wondering if the water will hold out
the hallucinations turn to simple villages
the music on the radio comes clear—
neither Rosenkavalier nor Götterdämmerung
but a woman’s voice singing old songs
with new words, with a quiet bass, a flute
plucked and fingered by women outside the law.
Super Gay Poems from editor Stephanie Burt is a treasure trove of excellence. A wide variety of poets and poems that makes for a wonderful collection of queer voices and Burt’s essays make for a great read. As Burt tells us, these poems ‘live: on the page, and in me, and in my essays about them, and maybe—if I got them right—in you.’ They live in me now too and I hope it will be the same for you as well. A lovely anthology indeed.
5/5
Queer
—Frank Bidart
Lie to yourself about this and you will
forever lie about everything.
Everybody already knows everything
so you can
lie to them. That's what they want.
But lie to yourself, what you will
lose is yourself. Then you
turn into them.
*
For each gay kid whose adolescence
was America in the forties or fifties
the primary, the crucial
scenario
forever is coming out—
or not. Or not. Or not. Or not. Or not.
*
Involuted velleities of self-erasure.
*
Quickly after my parents
died, I came out. Foundational narrative
designed to confer existence.
If I had managed to come out to my
mother, she would have blamed not
me, but herself.
The door through which you were shoved out
into the light
was self-loathing and terror.
*
Thank you, terror!
You learned early that adults' genteel
fantasies about human life
were not, for you, life. You think sex
is a knife
driven into you to teach you that.
Activist and queer historial Carlie Pendleton once wrote ‘to queer, as a verb, means to disrupt, to defy the binary.’ Each poem in this collection highlight a disruption to the cis, heteronormative society, ‘measuring each other’s spirit, each other’s / limitless desire, / a whole new poetry beginning here,’ as Adrienne Rich wrote in Transcendental Etude and each poet is valiantly giving voice and making room for the queer community. In her introduction, Burt calls upon the words of academic literary critic Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick explaining that queerness is ‘what happens when the expectations we get from the straight world don’t line up with our lives,’ and these poems celebrate how ‘those mismatches make us.’ There is a wonderful variety of poetic voices and identities though even Burt admits she wished it were a bit more varied, yet still this makes for a great anthology. Especially with Burt’s beautifully written and insightful essays that ask us to look at each poem and walks us through examining all the working parts to better understand what is being said. I was thrilled to see a few non-binary and pan/bisexual poems—like the one by Hera Lindsay Bird—represented, which is my own identity. We have poems about coming out or poems about how ‘most of what is happening is hidden,’ as May Sarton wrote, we have poems of grief, yearning, joy and more. We especially are treated to poems about liberation and desire, such as Frank O'Hara’s closing lines: ‘It’s a summer day, / and I want to be wanted more than anything else in the world.’ Girl, same.
She Ties My Bow Tie
—Gabrielle Calvocoressi
What you thought was the sound of the deer drinking
at the base of the ravine was not their soft tongues
entering the water but my Love tying my bow tie.
We were in our little house just up from the ravine.
Forgive yourself. It’s easy to mistake her wrists
for the necks of deer. Her fingers move so deftly.
One could call them skittish, though not really because
they aren’t afraid of you. I know. You thought it was the deer
but they’re so far down you couldn’t possibly hear them.
No, this is the breeze my Love makes when she ties me up
and sends me out into the world. Her breath
pulled taut and held until she’s through. I watch her
in the mirror, not even looking at me. She’s so focused
on the knot and how to loop the silk into a bow.
There are so many lovely poems here and it is such a riotous celebration of the self. I’m reminded of the above poet, Calvocoressi, who wrote in At Last the New Arriving —a poem not present here but worth reading anyhow—‘Dance until your bones clatter. What a prize / you are. What a lucky sack of stars.’ I think it is important to offer such positive visibility, to help those who live in fear find comfort in belonging, to help those steeped in shame to embrace themselves instead. In the poem Summer , poet Chen Chen (who’s debut collection When I Grow Up I Want to Be a List of Further Possibilities was very inspiring and instrumental in my own coming out as nonbinary and pansexual after going back into hiding after leaving the safety of my University community) discusses how a visible queer community can be a life saver:
‘Reporters & fathers call your generation “the worst.”
Which really means “queer kids who could go online & learn that queer doesn’t have to mean disaster.”
Or dead.
Instead, queer means, splendiferously, you.’
Chen Chen reminds readers that you can tell those who shamed you, such as his own father, ‘you were wrong to say that I had to change. / To make me promise I would.’ It is a really empowering moment. Coming out is a big part of this collection, such as in the wonderfully titled poem So Your GF Wants to Come Out as Bi and Polyamorous to Her Very Conservative Family by The Cyborg Jillian Weise that ends as such:
I am writing this
to the later-in-life
queer women.
you cannot do it
wrong. There’s
no wrong way
to do it. Come out
any way you want.
Come out alive.
It can be a terrifying experience coming out, and a dangerous one. In the United States, queer teens are 120% more likely to experience homelessness with 40% of the 4.2 million unhoused youth identifying as LGBTQ+ compared to 10% of the total population. Queer people without a support system are also four times more likely to attempt suicide and there is an alarmingly growing violence against all queer identities but especially trans women. The rates are significantly increased for BIPOC individuals identifying as LGBTQ+. It is why support is so direly necessary. ‘I take your hand beside the compost heap / glad to be alive and still / with you’ write the great Audre Lorde in Walking Our Boundaries . Take comfort, find a community, find support, stay alive. You are worth it.
‘My name is Slow and Stumbling. I come from planet
Trouble. I am here to love you uncomfortable.’
—Jericho Brown, from Heart Condition
There are also poems about the struggles of having to hide ones identity or love and the troubles with an unwelcoming society. How often heterosexual couples take for granted being able to be open, or even be legally together in certain countries, not worrying ‘she should be / getting home’ as Kay Ryan writes in The First of Never tapping into the anxiety of getting caught, stealing tiny spaces of time because ‘that’s the / only kind / of time / we’ve ever known.’ Other poets address the haters with more of a pushback, as Judy Grahn quips:
‘she has taken a woman lover
whatever shall we do
she has taken a woman lover
how lucky it wasn’t you’
There is a lovely diversity of voices present, such as the poem from Roque Salas Rivera presented in Spanish and English, or poem addressing the intersections of marginalized identities and colonialism. ‘Before Empire’s letters spelled out homo / you tired saris and danced launda ke naach’ says Rajiv Mohabir in Indo-Queer I , ‘Now the white Christian wants to bind you down / in his cellar, horny to tear your throat open.’ Poetry serves us as a tool to lean into cultural histories or roles in a path to ‘become authentic, and to push back against a white, Anglo monoculture that would erase who they are and who they might be,’ Burt writes, commenting on how Moghabir is ‘embodying queerness’ in ways that an ‘upbringing in the United States tried to hide or deny.’ It all makes for a very powerful read.
Twenty-One Love Poems, XIII
——Adrienne Rich
The rules break like a thermometer,
quicksilver spills across the charted systems,
we’re out in a country that has no language
no laws, we’re chasing the raven and the wren
through gorges unexplored since dawn
whatever we do together is pure invention
the maps they gave us were out of date
by years… we’re driving through the desert
wondering if the water will hold out
the hallucinations turn to simple villages
the music on the radio comes clear—
neither Rosenkavalier nor Götterdämmerung
but a woman’s voice singing old songs
with new words, with a quiet bass, a flute
plucked and fingered by women outside the law.
Super Gay Poems from editor Stephanie Burt is a treasure trove of excellence. A wide variety of poets and poems that makes for a wonderful collection of queer voices and Burt’s essays make for a great read. As Burt tells us, these poems ‘live: on the page, and in me, and in my essays about them, and maybe—if I got them right—in you.’ They live in me now too and I hope it will be the same for you as well. A lovely anthology indeed.
5/5
October 2, 2025
'Is queer love different in kind from cisgender, heterosexual affection? Or is it fundamentally the same? Is it true, as the bumper stickers say, that love is love?'
Review to follow.
Review to follow.
January 3, 2025
Stephanie Burt’s Super Gay Poems: LGBTQIA+ Poetry After Stonewall is a collection that not only showcases LGBTQIA+ poetry but also offers Burt’s insightful analyses. This collection features an array of queer voices, spanning generations and experiences, while Burt provides thoughtful commentary on each poem, contextualizing it within queer history. The book strikes a balance between the academic and the personal, making it both intellectually and emotionally resonant.
Although I didn’t personally relate to most of the poems, Burt’s authentic commentary made each one feel well thought out and purposeful. Her reflections brought clarity and depth to the poems, helping me appreciate their layers of meaning even when their experiences differed from my own. Some of her observations were so striking and incisive that I found myself underlining passages to return to later.
The collection is as varied in form as it is in content, featuring traditional poetic structures alongside experimental and modern forms. These poems transcend borders and languages, reflecting LGBTQIA+ experiences from across the globe.
This collection is ideal for LGBTQIA+ readers seeking a literary space where their experiences are explored and validated. With its wide range of poets and perspectives, the anthology offers a comprehensive exploration of queer identity, artistry, and resilience. It is equally valuable for those interested in understanding how poetry can intersect with queer history and self-expression. Burt’s curation ensures that the collection is both a celebration of queer voices and a testament to their resilience and creativity.
Although I didn’t personally relate to most of the poems, Burt’s authentic commentary made each one feel well thought out and purposeful. Her reflections brought clarity and depth to the poems, helping me appreciate their layers of meaning even when their experiences differed from my own. Some of her observations were so striking and incisive that I found myself underlining passages to return to later.
The collection is as varied in form as it is in content, featuring traditional poetic structures alongside experimental and modern forms. These poems transcend borders and languages, reflecting LGBTQIA+ experiences from across the globe.
This collection is ideal for LGBTQIA+ readers seeking a literary space where their experiences are explored and validated. With its wide range of poets and perspectives, the anthology offers a comprehensive exploration of queer identity, artistry, and resilience. It is equally valuable for those interested in understanding how poetry can intersect with queer history and self-expression. Burt’s curation ensures that the collection is both a celebration of queer voices and a testament to their resilience and creativity.
April 24, 2025
With a title like this, of course I had to get my hands on it right away, and the library came through. A fascinating selection of poems and the author's essays about them. I haven't read the whole book, but enough of it to return it to the library, knowing I'll likely buy a copy at some point, so I can return to the chapters on my favorite poets whenever I wish, and read the rest of it at my leisure. For now, I've enjoyed enough of it to be ready to put it back in circulation and let others enjoy it!
June 9, 2025
not all of the poetry in here was my thing, but the ones that were hit hard. I'm glad to have been introduced to so many more writers to explore! the analysis and history provided by Stephanie Burt was obviously deeply researched and really added a lot to the readings. while I didn't always agree with her analysis and disliked some of her word choices, I still appreciated reading her thoughts and feel like it's helped me come to a deeper understanding of poetry as an art form. this covers such a wide spread of writers and time periods and at points it felt overwhelming, so I would recommend taking your time with this one and possibly spacing it out between other books.
some of my fave poems in this collection: 'Carol, in the park, chewing on straws' by Judy Grahn, 'Nights of 1962: The River Merchant's Wife' by Marilyn Hacker, 'The Worrying' by Paul Monette (this one effected me so deeply I had to put the book down for a while before I could continue reading), 'Object Lessons' by Essex Hemphill, 'In the South That Winter' by Cherry Smyth, 'Apparition' by Mark Doty, 'Heart Condition' by Jericho Brown, 'The First of Never' by Kay Ryan, 'The Valleys Are Lush and Steep' by Trace Peterson, and 'She Ties My Bow Tie' by Gabrielle Calvocoressi.
some of my fave poems in this collection: 'Carol, in the park, chewing on straws' by Judy Grahn, 'Nights of 1962: The River Merchant's Wife' by Marilyn Hacker, 'The Worrying' by Paul Monette (this one effected me so deeply I had to put the book down for a while before I could continue reading), 'Object Lessons' by Essex Hemphill, 'In the South That Winter' by Cherry Smyth, 'Apparition' by Mark Doty, 'Heart Condition' by Jericho Brown, 'The First of Never' by Kay Ryan, 'The Valleys Are Lush and Steep' by Trace Peterson, and 'She Ties My Bow Tie' by Gabrielle Calvocoressi.
October 3, 2025
REALLY dense, but I enjoyed the variety of perspectives from different points in American history
Favorite lines:
- "To read a poem is to imagine a life, whether or not it's a life that is or could be yours. Lives- especially lives that are, or have been, oppressed, or erased- deserve to be seen and heard." (7)
- "What kind of cruel society makes people feel lucky to remain closeted, or lucky not to be gay?" (18)
- "It's hard to know what bisexuality means. It just...comes over you, like an urban sandstorm..." (213)
-"Queer women, you cannot do it wrong. There's no wrong way to do it. Come out any way you want. Come out alive." (302)
Favorite lines:
- "To read a poem is to imagine a life, whether or not it's a life that is or could be yours. Lives- especially lives that are, or have been, oppressed, or erased- deserve to be seen and heard." (7)
- "What kind of cruel society makes people feel lucky to remain closeted, or lucky not to be gay?" (18)
- "It's hard to know what bisexuality means. It just...comes over you, like an urban sandstorm..." (213)
-"Queer women, you cannot do it wrong. There's no wrong way to do it. Come out any way you want. Come out alive." (302)
Read
December 11, 2025I also read this for Queer and Trans Literatures and I really love so many of the poems on it. My favorites were "Cancer, Leo Rising," "Twenty-One Love Poems, XIII," and "You Throw a Party and Everyone You Have Ever Been Attracted To Is There." Stephanie Burt is a great analyst and they helped me understand even the most abstract poems.
May 25, 2025
I need to sit down with this one and literally annotate the annotations. Stephanie Burt is genius.
July 16, 2025
𝐁𝐎𝐎𝐊 𝐑𝐄𝐕𝐈𝐄𝐖: 𝐒𝐔𝐏𝐄𝐑 𝐆𝐀𝐘 𝐏𝐎𝐄𝐌𝐒
𝐀𝐔𝐓𝐇𝐎𝐑: 𝐒𝐓𝐄𝐏𝐇𝐀𝐍𝐈𝐄 𝐁𝐔𝐑𝐓
• 𝐒𝐔𝐏𝐄𝐑 𝐆𝐀𝐘 𝐏𝐎𝐄𝐌𝐒: 𝐋𝐆𝐁𝐓𝐐𝐈𝐀 + 𝐏𝐎𝐄𝐓𝐑𝐘 𝐀𝐅𝐓𝐄𝐑 𝐒𝐓𝐎𝐍𝐄𝐖𝐀𝐋𝐋 is a bold anthology that is a one of a kind evolution of queer poetry in the decades after 1969 𝐒𝐭𝐨𝐧𝐞𝐰𝐚𝐥𝐥 𝐫𝐢𝐨𝐭𝐬. This book feels like a hybrid text filled with evolutions. The voices came past as a lyrical dialogue of revolution and attachment.
• This book celebrates 𝐫𝐞𝐬𝐢𝐥𝐢𝐞𝐧𝐜𝐞, 𝐚𝐫𝐭, 𝐬𝐨𝐩𝐡𝐢𝐬𝐭𝐢𝐜𝐚𝐜𝐲, 𝐢𝐝𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐢𝐭𝐲, 𝐢𝐧𝐝𝐢𝐯𝐢𝐝𝐮𝐚𝐥𝐢𝐭𝐲 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐣𝐨𝐲. It is like the window that we are talking about. The queer life is here - the mini essays serve as an acknowledgement for those who get themselves involved into this gender searching engine. The writings are guiding readers through political and social changes of clarity and critical insight that come with 𝐋𝐆𝐁𝐓𝐐 𝐜𝐨𝐦𝐦𝐮𝐧𝐢𝐭𝐲.
• There's an eye opening style of this book - 𝐅𝐫𝐚𝐧𝐤 𝐎’ 𝐇𝐚𝐫𝐚, 𝐀𝐮𝐝𝐫𝐞 𝐋𝐨𝐫𝐝𝐞, 𝐉𝐮𝐝𝐲 𝐆𝐫𝐚𝐡𝐧 and many more established their notions. And Frankly speaking, we are here to accept what others have to offer. I know we're changing but we have to know - from where. Let's not denounce the fact that we are the one who are creating and destroying identities but we are also on the verge of acceptance.
• The closure comes with “𝐪𝐮𝐞𝐞𝐫 𝐭𝐢𝐦𝐞” and also with love, marriage and rights - they come chronologically but also satisfactorily they're seen as emotional, physical and mental. Not all the poetries are tragic, they are also playful, sophisticated and full of manners.
• So if you're talking about a system that has been retrieved from a long lost archive then it's the time to dig into the lines of this book. The anthologies and the resources that this book puts together are more like a gift.
𝐀𝐔𝐓𝐇𝐎𝐑: 𝐒𝐓𝐄𝐏𝐇𝐀𝐍𝐈𝐄 𝐁𝐔𝐑𝐓
• 𝐒𝐔𝐏𝐄𝐑 𝐆𝐀𝐘 𝐏𝐎𝐄𝐌𝐒: 𝐋𝐆𝐁𝐓𝐐𝐈𝐀 + 𝐏𝐎𝐄𝐓𝐑𝐘 𝐀𝐅𝐓𝐄𝐑 𝐒𝐓𝐎𝐍𝐄𝐖𝐀𝐋𝐋 is a bold anthology that is a one of a kind evolution of queer poetry in the decades after 1969 𝐒𝐭𝐨𝐧𝐞𝐰𝐚𝐥𝐥 𝐫𝐢𝐨𝐭𝐬. This book feels like a hybrid text filled with evolutions. The voices came past as a lyrical dialogue of revolution and attachment.
• This book celebrates 𝐫𝐞𝐬𝐢𝐥𝐢𝐞𝐧𝐜𝐞, 𝐚𝐫𝐭, 𝐬𝐨𝐩𝐡𝐢𝐬𝐭𝐢𝐜𝐚𝐜𝐲, 𝐢𝐝𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐢𝐭𝐲, 𝐢𝐧𝐝𝐢𝐯𝐢𝐝𝐮𝐚𝐥𝐢𝐭𝐲 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐣𝐨𝐲. It is like the window that we are talking about. The queer life is here - the mini essays serve as an acknowledgement for those who get themselves involved into this gender searching engine. The writings are guiding readers through political and social changes of clarity and critical insight that come with 𝐋𝐆𝐁𝐓𝐐 𝐜𝐨𝐦𝐦𝐮𝐧𝐢𝐭𝐲.
• There's an eye opening style of this book - 𝐅𝐫𝐚𝐧𝐤 𝐎’ 𝐇𝐚𝐫𝐚, 𝐀𝐮𝐝𝐫𝐞 𝐋𝐨𝐫𝐝𝐞, 𝐉𝐮𝐝𝐲 𝐆𝐫𝐚𝐡𝐧 and many more established their notions. And Frankly speaking, we are here to accept what others have to offer. I know we're changing but we have to know - from where. Let's not denounce the fact that we are the one who are creating and destroying identities but we are also on the verge of acceptance.
• The closure comes with “𝐪𝐮𝐞𝐞𝐫 𝐭𝐢𝐦𝐞” and also with love, marriage and rights - they come chronologically but also satisfactorily they're seen as emotional, physical and mental. Not all the poetries are tragic, they are also playful, sophisticated and full of manners.
• So if you're talking about a system that has been retrieved from a long lost archive then it's the time to dig into the lines of this book. The anthologies and the resources that this book puts together are more like a gift.
August 28, 2025
This book is a dazzling, emotionally rich collection that embraces queerness with humour, honesty, and heart. Burt writes with a playful yet precise voice, weaving together pop culture, personal memory, and poetic tradition. The poems are accessible but layered, easy to understand while often moving from the whimsical to the profound in a single breath. Whether reflecting on gender, fandom, or desire, her work invites the readers into a world where being “super gay” is not just about identity but it is a celebration. It’s a joyous, clever, and refreshingly delicate book.
I rarely read poetry but these were really touching and fun to dive into. As a literature student, I know I should be reading more poetry but even when I do it’s generally the classics. So this book is totally like a breath of fresh air with its candour and unapologetic expression.
I rarely read poetry but these were really touching and fun to dive into. As a literature student, I know I should be reading more poetry but even when I do it’s generally the classics. So this book is totally like a breath of fresh air with its candour and unapologetic expression.
August 30, 2025
The book is more than just a poetry collection. Each poem is followed by short essays from Burt that explain the history, context, and impact of the writer. These essays add depth and make the anthology feel like both a celebration of individual poets and a collective story of resilience, art, and identity.
Some poems are emotional and heartbreaking while others are playful, lyrical, and filled with joy. Together, they reflect queer life in its many forms. Burt shares in her introduction that this is the book she wished she had when she was young and searching for herself. That honesty makes the anthology even more powerful.
Though not every poem may speak to every reader, there is something here for everyone. This book is a gift of voices, history, and visibility, and it deserves a special place on every bookshelf.
Some poems are emotional and heartbreaking while others are playful, lyrical, and filled with joy. Together, they reflect queer life in its many forms. Burt shares in her introduction that this is the book she wished she had when she was young and searching for herself. That honesty makes the anthology even more powerful.
Though not every poem may speak to every reader, there is something here for everyone. This book is a gift of voices, history, and visibility, and it deserves a special place on every bookshelf.
September 30, 2025
I picked this book up thinking it was a collection of LGBTQ+ poetry. It includes poems that fit that description but the book is mainly intricate essays about the poems, their writers and influences. Fascinating in their own way but not what I was looking for. I like to react to poems off my own bat rather than analyse them to bits.
If I'm already familiar with a poem or its writer I may be able to cope with the analysis - like Bisexuality by Hera Lindsay Bird. I know and love the poem so the essay added layers.
https://www.vice.com/en/article/read-...
With poems new to me I found the deluge of context too much.
If I'm already familiar with a poem or its writer I may be able to cope with the analysis - like Bisexuality by Hera Lindsay Bird. I know and love the poem so the essay added layers.
https://www.vice.com/en/article/read-...
With poems new to me I found the deluge of context too much.
June 9, 2025
From the start, the five (5) existing reviews did not bode well, so I tempered my expectations accordingly. The title of the anthology made me think there wouldn't be much emotional depth within its contents, but that wasn't the case. The analytical paragraphs after each poem were a super interesting concept. I tried to read the OG work, then the commentary, then return with a new perspective. But I wasn't a big fan of the style of analysis, it felt impersonal and overly chronological. I think I may have resonated with the poems better without it.
November 20, 2025
Really thoughtful collection. Burt does a tremendous job curating the content, with insightful essays explaining each one. I think folks who are new to poetry and queer/literary theory might especially benefit since Burt does a masterful job of explaining complex theories. My one critique is that I think the more contemporary the poems become, the less revelatory Burt’s analysis becomes. The close readings become more platitudinous and superficial. But that’s only the final dozen or so. The ones leading up to that are all great
October 19, 2025
I really loved the poems in this collection, and while the analysis was thought-provoking, I felt the title implied it wouldn't be there at all. Hence the very average three star book rating ☆☆☆ from me.
November 15, 2025
Good poems. Interesting format with dense analysis and historical context following each piece, but this aspect (which winds up being the majority of the book) felt a little too academic for my personal relationship to poetry and I didn’t really resonate with it.
January 1, 2026
A gorgeous collection with descriptions by the editor, Professor Stephanie Burt of Harvard University, for additional context and analysis. Reading this book felt like sitting in a beloved poetry class!
April 22, 2025
Burt’s book offers a collection of LGBTQIA+ poetry from after 1969. What makes this collection work so well is that it provides not only the poems, but also analyses of the work that place it in historical and literary context. Even if I didn’t like every poem presented, I still learned a lot about the authors, their influences, and their contemporaries. In that vein, I think this book is very successful and would be great for student or scholarly use.
The book’s primary weakness is one that Burt openly acknowledges in the work itself: it could feature more LGBTQIA+ writers with identities outside of gay and lesbian. Likewise, it could feature more racially and ethnically diverse authors. As mentioned, Burt does try to include as many identities as possible, but maybe there’s room for a follow up book with more focus on these less represented (and anthologized) authors.
The book’s primary weakness is one that Burt openly acknowledges in the work itself: it could feature more LGBTQIA+ writers with identities outside of gay and lesbian. Likewise, it could feature more racially and ethnically diverse authors. As mentioned, Burt does try to include as many identities as possible, but maybe there’s room for a follow up book with more focus on these less represented (and anthologized) authors.
Displaying 1 - 18 of 18 reviews