First Loves: Poets Introduce the Essential Poems that Captivated and Inspired Them

by Carmela Ciuraru (Editor)

In 1996 the editor of the journal of the Poetry Society of America asked several poets to write about their first verse loves. So inspiring were their responses that the feature became a series, and now we are lucky enough to have 68 contributions in book form. Surely every poet in First Loves hopes that his or her choice will increase that work's audience; some even cheat and include several other objects of affection while they're at it. John Hollander, for instance, gets in everyone from Robert Louis Stevenson to A.A. Milne to Rudyard Kipling to James Weldon Johnson before settling on James Hogg's "A Boy's Song." Similarly, Elizabeth Macklin tells us, "It depends how far back you want to go," giving herself the chance to tout Frost, Lorca, and Countee Cullen en route to anointing Auden's wistful villanelle "If I Could Tell You." Though they range from the serious to the whimsical (Billy Collins begins with "My first love was a tall, thin brunette named "The Flea" by John Donne that I met when I was in college"), most entries stress their choice's power and mystery, its ability to transform, console, and enchant. Some contributions are short and sweet. A.R. Ammons's single paragraph allows John McCrae's "In Flanders Field" the starring role it deserves. Ditto for Richard Howard's two sentences on Browning's "My Last Duchess." On the other hand, Eavan Boland's six paragraphs preceding Yeats's "The Wild Swans at Coole" set her moment of discovery at 15, and also manage to encompass what's past, passing, and to come.

Of course, singling out some for high praise is to omit many inspired and inspiring others. Readers will be struck, for instance, by Wanda Coleman's choice of Lewis Carroll's "Perhaps because when he freed Alice in the mirror, he also freed my imagination and permitted me to imagine myself living in an adventure, sans the restraints of a racist society." "Jabberwocky" also figures in Joyce Carol Oates's and Lawrence Raab's entries, and one of the delights of reading First Loves is seeing which poets pop up more than once. As several make clear, Stevenson's Child's Garden of Verses merits a grown-up audience too. There are of course Yeats and Auden, Wordsworth and Dickinson, but also the now unsung Alfred Noyes and Swinburne. If anyone can rescue the latter from neglect, it will be Ursula "Some might consider this like a thirteen-year-old finding that Southern Comfort tastes nice. (Get that away from her! Quick! Pour it out!) But Swinburne took me past story, past meaning, into the pure music of the word."

In many ways, Carmela Ciuraru's anthology is a subversive plea for the power of control, discipline, and study. These artists have spent endless hours with their forebears, and know that their vocation requires discipline and knowledge in addition to inspiration. Heather McHugh is clearly none too happy that one of her graduate charges "asked in class just who was this John Donne I kept mentioning." Yet First Loves both prods and delights, and the participating poets have planted a very adult garden of verses. --Kerry Fried

Genres: Poetry, Essays

268 pages, Paperback

Published January 1, 2000

About the author

Carmela Ciuraru is the author of Nom de Plume: A (Secret) History of Pseudonyms, and her anthologies include First Loves: Poets Introduce the Essential Poems That Captivated and Inspired Them and Solitude Poems. She is a member of PEN American and the National Book Critics Circle, and she has been interviewed on The Today Show and by newspapers and radio stations internationally. She lives in New York City.

Reviews

[Katherine · Rating 5 out of 5]

Acclaimed poets sharing the poems that first stole their hearts into the world of poetry and never returned them...obviously this book gets five stars from me.

[Mary · Rating 5 out of 5]

About 70 contemporary poets explain their
connection with one particular poem that
turned each on to poetry. The first-loved
poets range from Shakespeare to Rodgers &
Hart, with some getting the nod more than
once. But only one poem is cited more
than once:"Jabberwocky" rang the bell for
two modern poets.

[John Fredrickson · Rating 3 out of 5]

Some of the sections of this book are inspired, where a poet introduces some verse segment that highlights a poet who is not well-known, or makes a well-known but difficult poem more accessible. The problem with this book, though, is that many of the sections come across as hastily done homework assignments, where the poet that is writing has no clear recollections of a favorite poem, but turns in their assignment nonetheless.

[Natalie · Rating 2 out of 5]

Operation Enjoy Poetry is going poorly

10/67

[Suzanne Macdowell · Rating 5 out of 5]

I truly enjoyed reading these poems and also reading the essays that accompanied them. Made me appreciate works I had never read before as well as old favorites I now see in a whole new light.

[Denis Collins · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a very enjoyable read. it is always interesting to read what other people really like. In this case you also get to read the poems they first fell in love with. It is one of those books you can dip in and out of and it makes sense. You will also find yourself reciting the poems you know. It should also prompt you to remember the first poem you fell in love with. Go on try it out.

[Sarah · Rating 5 out of 5]

I didn't care about every poet, nor did I care about every poem chosen. But reading many of the essays was completely delightful. And it was nice to have someone knowledgeable explain to me why I should care about Hart Crane or confirm for me that Yeats was such a jerk but so undeniably good.

[Dana Lynn · Rating 5 out of 5]

Jumped out at me in the library. Read while going through a pregnancy with my daughter. There’s nothing better than preparing with a good book. Read while pregnant with Everlynn.