Controlled Explosions

The Penguin Modern Poets are succinct guides to the richness and diversity of contemporary poetry. Every volume brings together representative selections from the work of three poets now writing, allowing the curious reader and the seasoned lover of poetry to encounter the most exciting voices of our moment.
"Is it any wonder I've got
too much blood on my hands? The calls
are coming from inside the house.
I'm sick of my insane demands."
- Michael Robbins, 'Peel Off the Scabs'
". . . The childhood of the dunk
was no childhood at all.
He practiced on a paper route, throwing The Sun
to the same place each morning. Did not sleep long
but when he slept, the springs of his bed imparted
something to him. At night the streetlight floated
down and let him dribble it."
- Patricia Lockwood, 'The Descent of the Dunk'
"if my signal drops it's because i've climbed with them, we're so high now
i can in one single inverted yawn of my eyes full of skin and sex and fury see the whole city i so slowly streetlamp by streetlamp from the other side spent my life seeing in a drowning
"and this one boy here he's doing
he's doing a painting, it's the last day of august, it's a painting of a bed and"
- Timothy Thornton, 'Voicemail for David Hoyle'