Very Collected Poems

Over sixty years of poems celebrating one of the most dynamic careers in twentieth and twenty-first century American poetry. Gathering a lifetime of poetry, Ron Padgett’s Very Collected Poems is the ultimate record of the Pulitzer Prize finalist’s oeuvre—newly updated since the sold-out first edition of 2013. Padgett’s poems reverberate with his love of poetry, his musings on artists and musicians from Andrew Marvell to Woody Guthrie to his personal friendships with Kenneth Koch and Joe Brainard, alongside his poems involving family and the magic of just being alive. By turns imaginative and witty, and then simple and direct, Padgett’s mercurial work offers readers the pleasure of his surprising curiosity and generous spirit.