Edna St. Vincent Millay (1892 - 1950) is the poet all of us used to read when we were teenagers, the way a later generation of young women were thrilled by Sylvia Plath. 

The outspoken, unconventionally feminist and probably bisexual Millay was the most popular poet in America, the epitome of the…

And now for something completely different, you have to read Daisy Fried (1967--). 

Daisy is smart, and funny, self-mocking in the nicest way, and in love with the messiness of life.

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This is my favorite poem by the great nature poet Mary Oliver (1935--). 

Oliver’s poetry always is able to find bliss in solitude because she has such a keen eye for the life—and also the mortality—of the nonhuman world around her.

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Anne Sexton (1928-1974) is typically remembered as a “confessional poet” who wrote about depression and the impulse toward suicide. 

Yet she was also exuberantly life-loving.  This poem is inspirational for me because of the way it celebrates the female body and the way its joy spills over into a sense that all women share, in some mysterious way, in any woman’s luck—that we…

Here’s a poem by the wonderful poet Lucille Clifton (1935-2010) that never fails to make me smile. 

The woman’s hips are free, and so is she.  Forget about what a woman’s body is supposed to look like.  Forget about diets and Vogue.

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