"Brilliant ....certainly among the most gifted, vivid, and deft poets now writing in English."—Anthony Hecht, author of The Darkness and the Light An exuberant and bold series of poems drawing on the poet's life in the Catskill Mountains. Questions of exile and belonging figure prominently, as does the struggle to find a viable relationship with the natural world. In the chainsaw—the book's central image—all manner of human traits are reflected with an intense, often comical brilliance.

An anthology of some of the best poems submitted for the Forward Prizes as chosen by a range of judges including poets, literary writers, authors, actors and musicians.

'These annual anthologies of the poems in the running for the Forward Prizes remain the best way of encountering the richness that new poetry has to offer.' Daily Telegraph

Drowning in Wheat collects the best of three decades of John Kinsella's astonishing poetry in one volume. Kinsella is universally acknowledged as one of the greatest living Australian poets, and arguably the most important 'eco-poet' of the age; however, this collection also reveals a writer of unexpected and remarkable versatility, and one fluent in an almost bewildering range of forms, registers and voices. Despite its great thematic range, Kinsella's overarching project emerges all the more clearly: Drowning in Wheat is a clarion call and a call to order, a plea to listen to the earth - and to understand our own place within it while we still can. It is also an ideal introduction to one of the essential poets of the age.

To say these poems balance on the fulcrum between grief and joy is too easy. Who's Asking? is a book of questions - about the nature of wonder, of meaning, questions about being caught between earth and heaven like the angels of Paul Klee's paintings who speak some of these poems. In other words, questions about the rigorous yet remorseless undertaking of being human. Large questions that bulge with a terrible asking but also those that bloom from close observation of the most ordinary circumstance. All of them shaded by the unrelenting awareness that Nobody gets saved. And yet this book is gifted with unexpected humor, unequivocal wisdom.

“Mesmerizing, magical, deeply moving.” —Elif Shafak Expanding on the popular podcast of the same name from On Being Studios, Poetry Unbound offers immersive reflections on fifty powerful poems. In the tumult of our contemporary moment, poetry has emerged as an inviting, consoling outlet with a unique power to move and connect us, to inspire fury, tears, joy, laughter, and surprise. This generous anthology pairs fifty illuminating poems with poet and podcast host Pádraig Ó Tuama’s appealing, unhurried reflections. With keen insight and warm personal anecdotes, Ó Tuama considers each poem’s artistry and explores how its meaning can reach into our own lives. Focusing mainly on poets writing today, Ó Tuama engages with a diverse array of voices that includes Ada Limón, Ilya Kaminsky, Margaret Atwood, Ocean Vuong, Layli Long Soldier, and Reginald Dwayne Betts. Natasha Trethewey meditates on miscegenation and Mississippi; Raymond Antrobus makes poetry out of the questions shot at him by an immigration officer; Martín Espada mourns his father; Marie Howe remembers and blesses her mother’s body; Aimee Nezhukumatathil offers comfort to her child-self. Through these wide-ranging poems, Ó Tuama guides us on an inspiring journey to reckon with self-acceptance, history, independence, parenthood, identity, joy, and resilience. For anyone who has wanted to try their hand at a conversation with poetry but doesn’t know where to start, Poetry Unbound presents a window through which to celebrate the art of being alive.