100 books like Selected Poems of Anne Sexton

Rumi is one of those writers that transcends time and space. He is more of a spiritual writer and when he writes about love and longing, you can feel the words plant a seed inside your soul. If someone asked me which poetry book they should begin reading without any knowledge of poetry, Rumi would be a start. The simplicity of his words taught me that you don’t need to use a thesaurus to express yourself. His simple words and poems about soul mates carry his work over centuries. This poetry book tells you how lovers don’t finally meet somewhere, they’re in each other all along. These famous quotes of Rumi’s will be instilled in you again and again. Easy book to read and carry with you anywhere. It taught me to find my spirituality and soul and let it flow like a river with words as waves. It taught… show more.

One of the first books of poetry I ever read with awe. Actually, I still do. No other poet on the face of the earth, besides Sexton, has ever blown me away with words like Plath. I personally loved this book because it showed me how to write poetry. It is like a kind of bible for me. I have the facsimile of Plath’s manuscript and when I look at her handwriting and the fluidity of certain images I can see what a gifted poet Plath was. It taught me how to express words without telling. It taught me how to use imagery like a fancy dress on a night out on the town. For anyone who wants to begin reading poetry, start here. This book helped me see that reality is distorted, that the past and present and future can be held in one poem. It helped me overcome… show more.

I recently discovered Kim Addonizio and wanted to include her to share with you a modern poet I am recently obsessed with. I am also reading her book of memoirs at the moment and I am loving her raw style. I was going to put Bukowski in my five picks but I wanted to make it about women. Hench here is a modern poet who comes close to that raw and in-your-face poetry. Confessional poetry, like Plath and Sexton’s, has been my favorite genre, but Addonizio gives it a raw twist with a shot of vodka. I love how Addonizio’s poems slap you in the face with truth. Her poems teach me how to be comfortable sharing my own stories with strangers. Her poems teach me it’s okay to lie about it too. A place where reality and fantasy merge. I would recommend this book to anyone who wants to… show more.

I love this book because it’s an epic poetry book. The first of its kind. Three-hundred and ninety-six-page poetry book. Ariana Reines is one of my favorite top three modern poets as well. Poetry lovers should have this book in their collection. If not, what are you waiting for? It’s a masterpiece. I can see her soul in this book, I can see her heart. I can see her mind. It’s as if sand is literally under your feet as you read these poems divided into sections. This book is meant to be read slowly, like a fine glass of wine. It took me months to read it. It taught me that a poet is an artist and is a traveler of time and space. It taught me to break rules and to do whatever you want as a poet. It taught me to not limit myself as a writer… show more.

I’ve probably read this amazing book more than any other book of poems. It is Howe’s elegy to her brother John, who died of an AIDS-related illness in 1989. I love how the book reads almost like a novel in verse, returning to her brother time and again. Howe’s poems bring together the physical and spiritual in transcendent ways. It was one the of first books I reread after I lost my mother during the pandemic—a companion during my grief. The famous title poem explores the everydayness of life even after loss—clogged kitchen sinks, groceries, parking the car, all that her brother “finally gave up.” The final line of the poem captures the book perfectly: “I am living, I remember you.”

While, yes, this is not a novel, there is a true character journey in reading the complete works of Ms. Sexton in sequence; a sort of poetic analysis the likes of which I have not read to such a soul-baring degree, as she depicts her thoughts and struggles with marriage, relationships, motherhood, her own parents and various other facets of her life. To me, Ms. Sexton is very much the symbol of what became the confessional poetry movement. The eloquence and depth of her writing, especially in poems like " The Double Image", "Flee on Your Donkey" and " For My Lover Returning to His Wife", are remarkable.

Lowell began this memoir in a mental hospital. He was told it may help him recover from a manic-depressive condition. But he never finished it. He sold the manuscript to Harvard University and there it mouldered away for forty years until editors Steven Gould Axelrod and Grzegorz Kosc resurrected it. Lowell had never meant it to be published. Yet, in this manuscript we discover the bones of his famous poetic work Life Studies, which virtually turned him into one of the greatest of Confessional poets. The manuscript that fell between the cracks demonstrates what a great prose writer Lowell was, and how the language of his poetry was already embedded in these prose descriptions. 

A timeless 1860 classic, given fresh vision with illustrations and complementary documents on the 1775 Patriot’s Ride by Christopher Bing.

This book not only brings the history of this period to life, but also the importance of Longfellow himself as a period storyteller and poet. This book illuminates key events in American history that make one want to learn even more.

This long narrative poem has the most lyrical descriptions of sailing I’ve ever read, so back in my teens, I memorized it. It takes 30 minutes to recite. While voyaging under sail in the Pacific, reciting it twice would get me though the first lonely hour of my long night watch. Even today, reciting the poem sends my spirit back to the open sea.

The first turning point of the story is when the charismatic albatross is shot for no reason. The second turning point is when the mariner breaks the curse by overcoming his revulsion for the ocean’s non-charismatic “slimy things that crawl” and he blesses them. So we learn to value all life, charismatic or not.

This is one of the first books I read to my children at bedtime. It's an amusing rhyming story with a wonderfully funny ending. My children loved joining in with the rhymes and would add funny voices for each animal. They always pretended to be surprised by the ending and would try not to giggle too early when I turned to the last page. This is a family favourite and brings back great memories.