The Best American Poetry 2015 Read Free Page A

expected places. The spirit of democracy on display is nevertheless not inconsistent with the search for literary excellence.
    There are those who expect our “hyphenated” poets to write obsessively or even exclusively about their identity and to demonstrate a degree of social responsibility to the group they represent. But Sherman’s poetry rebuffs this patronizing expectation. A Spokane/Coeur d’Alene tribal member, Sherman grew up on a reservation and he has, as a result, a fertile source of subject matter. But his aim is to write good poems, not to represent a tribe, and he brings to his writing the exemplary qualities of intelligence and humor. Jessica Chapel of The Atlantic remarked that Alexie’s characters wonder “what it means to be an Indian, what they are told it means to be an Indian, and how to present themselves as Indians both to whites and other Indians.” Then the reporter asked the author: “Is this struggle or uncertainty endemic to the American Indian experience?”
    â€œIt’s endemic to everybody’s experience,” Alexie replied. “I think we’re all struggling with our identity. Literature is all about the searchfor identity, regardless of the ethnicity. Southern, New Yorker, black, white, Asian, immigrant—everyone’s trying to find a sense of belonging. In The Toughest Indian , the journalist’s primary struggle is not ethnic identity, but his sexuality. I don’t think he knows any of his identities. One of the points I was trying to make in that story is that being Indian is just part of who we are. I suppose the big difference in Indian literature is that Indians are indigenous to this country, so all non-Indian literature could be seen as immigrant literature. The search for immigrant identity is much different than the search for indigenous identity, so I suppose if you’re indigenous to a place and you’re still searching for your identity, that’s pretty ironic.” 7
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    Mark Strand, who died on November 29, 2014, was the guest editor of the 1991 volume in this series. At the time we worked together, he had completed The Continuous Life and was writing Dark Harbor , two of his best books. I was finishing Signs of the Times , my book on deconstruction and Paul de Man, cheered by Mark’s support—he loathed French critical theory and its effect on higher education. We would have long phone conversations twice a week or more to go over the poems that had come in and to talk about the shape of The Best American Poetry 1991 as it evolved. We picked a Hopper for the cover; Mark was writing a book on him. As we went into production he wrote a beautiful introductory essay that I had no trouble placing with The New York Times Book Review , which ran it on its front page. The series was still young enough that it seemed to demand all the attention we could give it, and we gave readings at Seton Hall University in New Jersey and at various New York locales. And then there were always bookstores to visit (the Strand!) or a Neil Welliver opening to attend as our friendship grew.
    Mark was a connoisseur of poems—as of so many things, from wine and food to clothes and paintings. His work would give off a casual, even effortless feel, as if the poet (who had initially studied to be a painter) were possessed of a certain kind of natural grace camouflaging all the craft and hard work. In Dark Harbor , he presents himself as a lucky man who knows the good life, striding on the pavement in his new dark blue double-breasted suit, lean and lanky, fresh after lunch at Lutèce with his longtime editor. The picture is accurate. He was a poet of unusual glamour (light is “the mascara of Eden”) and of romance.Yet the prevailing feeling in the depth of his best work is melancholy. If mortality is our first and last problem, the need to say farewell is continuous. Death is the mother of beauty;