Poetry

All the Reasons Why

By: Taylor Miller

About the Author

Taylor Miller discovered her love for writing at a young age. Her poetry debut took off in 2020 with the book You're Not Done Yet. From there, Miller's passion for writing poetry has expanded as she has found that her poems help create vulnerable and empowering connections with her readers.

About the Book

All the Reasons Why continues to share Miller's journey through trauma, healing, and recovery. This collection captures the raw realities of life. Poetry can be interpreted in many ways, and her hope is that readers will be able to find a sense of safety as they navigate through their own journeys.

Here is the good stuff: poetry written by women that actually excites the thinking reader. This anthology, spanning work of the last 75 years, will broaden its readers' notions of what defines erotic poetry. For what is more intriguing, more satisfying than strong, self-assured writing?

This groundbreaking anthology includes some of our most powerful women writers--among them Sharon Olds, Elizabeth Alexander, Anne Sexton, Dorianne Laux, Denise Levertov, Adrienne Rich, Lucille Clifton, and Louise Glück. These poets fully demonstrate that, far from being prurient, the erotic can permeate even the most mundane aspects of life, from reading a book to buying clothes.

At the same time, the collection affirms the enormous meaningfulness of poetry--its ability to express the inexpressible and to illuminate the most private and intimate of human experiences. The poets included here represent different ethnicities, geographies, social classes, and sexual preferences. The only characteristic they share is that they are women writing about sex.

While the poems in Steve Straight''s new collection lead the reader "into the dark forest of memory / or onto the carnival ride of hypothesis, / or even right off the cliff of surprise," they maintain a sure course through the din and distraction of modern life. Bits of news from the natural sciences, chance encounters, and even convicted felon and crafting queen Martha Stewart all fall under Straight's observant eye. The result is a collection of conversational poems that lend a sense of wonder to the commonplace.

From the Instagram poet and author of the exquisite Please Don't Go Before I Get Better comes a gorgeous poetry and prose collection that explores the meaning of "home" and the profound discovery of finding it within oneself--perfect for fans of Rupi Kaur and Amanda Lovelace.In this stunning third collection from Madisen Kuhn, Madisen eloquently analyzes some of life's universal themes within the framework of a house. Whether it's the garden, the bedroom, or the front porch, Madisen takes you into her own "home," sharing some of the most intimate parts of her life so that you might also, someday, feel free to share some of yours. Filled with beautiful hand-drawn illustrations from Melody Hansen, this boldly intimate, preternaturally wise, and emotionally candid collection encourages you to consider what home means to you--whether it's in the lush, green-lawned suburbs or a city apartment--and, more importantly, explores how you can find it even when home feels like it's on the far-off horizon.

In his debut collection, chosen by Mary Karr as a winner of the 2005 National Poetry Series, Tryfon Tolides weaves together poems that speak of desire, loss, and small joys. Tolides was born in a tiny village in Greece and his work is rooted in the mountains and wind and the deep interior of that place; his poems express a longing and a searching for peace, for home, for beauty, for escape. These poems constitute a lament, whether they concern themselves with the difficulties of assimilation or the question of whether it is possible for people to live with one another in a spirit of true understanding. They prove that the physical and the metaphysical can share residence, can even be one and the same.

In her highly ambitious second collection of poems, Katrina Vandenberg takes her inspiration from the alphabet.

A meditation on the hump of a camel, and what it hides. A reminder that tomatoes belong to the nightshade family, and a vision of the plant as Adam's downfall. The Book of Kells, gold-leafed and extravagantly decorated by monks. Titled for letters of the Phoenician alphabet, and employing such innovative forms as the ancient ghazal, these poems are richly grounded in objects both humble and exotic. Vandenberg explores the intersection of power and forgiveness, and deciphers the seemingly indecipherable in emotionally poignant ways. "What will protect us?" one poem asks. "The words will be our weapons. In the end."

Moving between the physical and the abstract, the individual and the collective, The Alphabet Not Unlike the World unearths meaning--with astonishing beauty--from the pain of loss and separation.

Always Danger offers a lyrical and highly imaginative exploration into the hazards that surround people's lives--whether it's violence, war, mental illness, car accidents, or the fury of Mother Nature. In his second collection of poems, David Hernandez embraces the element of surprise: a soldier takes refuge inside a hollowed-out horse, a man bullies a mountain, and a giant pink donut sponsors age-old questions about beliefs. Hernandez typically eschews the politics that often surround the inner circle of contemporary literature, but in this volume he quietly sings a few bars with a political tone: one poem shadows the conflict in Iraq, another reflects our own nation's economic and cultural divide. Always Danger parallels Hernandez's joy of writing: unmapped, spontaneous, and imbued with nuanced revelation.

Outsider poetry inspired by Ainsworth Rosewell, self-professed genius and con man who committed suicide in 1996 by jumping from the seventh floor of the Water Tower Mall. Subjects include relationships, death, sex, drugs, dogs, immortality, and Chicago, all exploding with nontraditional humor and vibrant characters, both real and imagined.