12 Contemporary Literature, 1970 to Present
(1993), Frame Structures: Early Poems 1974–1979 (1996), Pierce-Arrow (1999),
The Europe of Trusts (2002), Kidnapped (2002), and The Midnight (2003).
X. J. Kennedy (1929– )
Poet whose work has been collected in Nude Descending a Staircase (1961), Cel-
ebrations after the Death of John Brennan (1974), Dark Horses: New Poems (1992),
and The Lords of Misrule: Poems 1992-2002 (2002).
Galway Kinnell (1927– )
Poet, was awarded the Pulitzer Prize and National Book Award for Selected Poems
(1982) in 1983; his other works include What a Kingdom It Was (1960), Body Rags
(1968), The Book of Nightmares (1971), Mortal Acts, Mortal Words (1980), The Past
(1985), When One Has Lived a Long Time Alone (1990), Imperfect Thirst (1996), A
New Selected Poems (2000), Strong Is Your Hold (2006).
Ted Kooser (1939– )
Former poet laureate. His collection, Delights and Shadows (2004), won the Pulit-
zer Prize in 2005. Other works include Sure Signs (1980), One World at a Time
(1985), Weather Central (1994), and Winter Morning Walks: One Hundred Postcards
to Jim Harrison (2000).
Audre Lorde (1934–1992)
Poet and essayist. Her works of poetry include The First Cities (1968), Cables to
Rage (1970), From a Land Where Other People Live (1972), New York Head Shop
and Museum (1974), The Black Unicorn (1978), The Cancer Journals (1980), Cho-
sen Poems, Old and New (1982), Our Dead Behind Us (1986), and A Burst of Light
(1988), which won a National Book Award.
Robert Lowell (1917–1977)
Considered a founder of the confessional-poetry movement. His Lord Weary’s
Castle (1946) received the Pulitzer Prize in 1947. His other works include Land
of Unlikeness (1944), Poems, 1938–1949 (1950), The Mills of the Kavanaughs
(1951), Life Studies (1959), Imitations (1961), For the Union Dead (1964),
Selected Poems (1965), Near the Ocean (1967), The Voyage and Other Versions of
Poems by Baudelaire (1968), Notebooks, 1967–1968 (1969), History (1973), The
Dolphin (1973), For Lizzy and Harriet (1973), Selected Poems (1976), and Day
by Day (1977).
Naomi Shihab Nye (1952– )
Daughter of a Palestinian father and Anglo American mother, whose works
include Hugging the Jukebox (1982), Red Suitcase (1994), Fuel (1998), 19 Varieties
of Gazelle: Poems of the Middle East (2002), and You and Yours (2005).
Sharon Olds (1942– )
Poet whose works include Satan Says (1980), The One Girl at the Boys’ Party
(1983), The Dead and the Living (1984), The Gold Cell (1987), The Father (1993),
The Wellspring (1996), Blood, Tin, Straw (1999), The Unswept Room (2002), Strike
Sparks: Selected Poems (2004) and One Secret Thing (2008).