Professor of English and accomplished poet Kathy Mangan offers the following list of recommended poetry books:

“Salvation Blues: One Hundred Poems, 1985-2005” by Rodney Jones: Salvation Blues collects selected poems from six of Jones’ seven previous books, and includes 24 new works.  This marvelous collection of wry, wise poems confirms the assessment of Jones as “the supreme example of the southern human person speaking in American poetry” (The Southern Review).

“Flying at Night, Poems 1965-1985” by Ted Kooser: Kooser, the current U.S. Poet Laureate and Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress, is the master of the deceptively simple poem.  This volume collects some of his best, earlier work.  The Poetry Home Repair Manual, Kooser’s recent book about the writing of poetry, is a wonderful source of advice and solace to those new to the challenging joy of poetry writing.

“Here, Bullet” by Brian Turner: A poet-soldier, Turner served for seven years in the U.S. Army.  This book, which chronicles his year as an infantry team leader in Iraq, blends the horror of war with the beauty of landscape: “There were no bombs, no panic in the streets./ Sgt. Gutierrez didn’t comfort an injured man/ who cupped pieces of his friend’s brain/ in his hands; instead, today,/ white birds rose from the Tigris” (from “Curfew”).

“Tender Hooks” by Beth Ann Fennelly: Fennelly’s second book, published by Norton in 2004, focuses on her response to the experience of motherhood.  The title, explains Fennelly, “reflects the sharp/sweet ambiguities of parenting.”

“Collected Poems”, by Jane Kenyon: This beautiful new volume collects more than two decades of poems by Jane Kenyon.  Until her untimely death in 1995, Kenyon lived and wrote at Eagle Pond Farm in New Hampshire with her husband, poet Donald Hall.