Preface. CONTEMPORARY PERIOD: 1945 TO THE PRESENT. The Late 1940s and 1950s: Victory Culture. Hisaye Yamamoto (1921-2011). Seventeen Syllables. Elizabeth Bishop (1911-1979). The Fish. The Man-Moth.

At the Fishhouses. Filling Station. Theodore Roethke (1908-1963). Frau Bauman, Frau Schmidt, and Frau Schwartze. Root Cellar. Big Wind. My Papa''s Waltz. Elegy.

Ralph Ellison (1914-1994). A Party Down at the Square. Flying Home. Brave Words for a Startling Occasion. John Cheever (1912-1982). The Enormous Radio. Saul Bellow (1915-2005). Looking for Mr.

Green. Charles Olson (1910-1970). For Sappho, Back. I, Maximus of Gloucester, to You. Maximus, to Himself. Flannery O''Connor (1925-1964). A Good Man Is Hard to Find. Bienvenido Santos (1911-1996).

Scent of Apples. Tillie Lerner Olsen (1913-2007). O Yes. Bernard Malamud (1914-1986). The Magic Barrel. Arthur Miller (1915-2005). A View from the Bridge. Gwendolyn Brooks (1917-2000).

The Sundays of Satin-Legs Smith. The Mother. We Real Cool. A Bronzeville Mother Loiters in Mississippi. Meanwhile, a Mississippi Mother Burns Bacon. The Last Quatrain of the Ballad of Emmett Till. Ulysses. Mitsuye Yamada (b.

1923). From Camp Notes. James Baldwin (1924-1987). Sonny''s Blues. Philip Roth (b. 1933). You Can''t Tell a Man by the Song He Sings. Tennessee Williams (1911-1983).

Suddenly, Last Summer. In Focus: The Beat Movement. Allen Ginsberg (1926-1997). A Supermarket in California. Howl. America. Jack Kerouac (1922-1969). The Vanishing American Hobo.

From Mexico City Blues: 43rd Chorus and 211th Chorus. Lawrence Ferlinghetti (b. 1919). I Am Waiting. Dove Sta Amore . The Old Italians Dying. Brenda (Bonnie) Frazer (b. 1939).

from Troia: Mexican Memoirs. Joyce Johnson (b. 1934). from Door Wide Open. from Minor Characters. Gary Snyder (b. 1930). Riprap.

Vapor Trails. Wave. It Was When. Albert Saijo (b. 1926). Bodhisattva Vows. from Trip Trap (with Lew Welch and Jack Kerouac). Your Head.

The 1960s: Postmodernism and Other Violent Changes. Robert Lowell, Jr. (1917-1977). Skunk Hour. For Theodore Roethke. For the Union Dead. Near the Ocean. Thomas Pynchon (b.

1937). Entropy. Robert Creeley (1926-2005). Hart Crane. I Know a Man. For Love. Words. America.

Frank O''Hara (1926-1966). My Heart. The Day Lady Died. Why I Am Not a Painter. Poem. Robert Hayden (1913-1980). Those Winter Sundays. Summertime and the Living .

Mourning Poem for the Queen of Sunday. Anne Sexton (1928-1974). Her Kind. Housewife. Young. Somewhere in Africa. Sylvia Plath (1932-1963). For a Fatherless Son.

Daddy. Lady Lazarus. Stings. Fever 103°. Kurt Vonnegut (1922-2007). Harrison Bergeron. John Ashbery (b. 1927).

The Instruction Manual. Farm Implements and Rutabagas in a Landscape. As You Came from the Holy Land. Edward Albee (b. 1928). The Sandbox. Martin Luther King, Jr. (1929-1968).

I Have a Dream. Letter from Birmingham Jail. Malcolm X (1925-1965). from The Autobiography of Malcolm X. Amiri Baraka (LeRoi Jones) (b. 1934). An Agony. As now.

Ka ''Ba. Black People: This Is Our Destiny. A Poem Some People Will Have to Understand. Numbers, Letters. Dutchman. Joyce Carol Oates (b. 1938). Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been? Luis Valdez (b.

1940). Los Vendidos. John Barth (b. 1930). Lost in the Funhouse. In Focus: The U.S. War in Vietnam and its Aftermath.

Michael Herr (b. 1940). from Dispatches. Tim O''Brien (b. 1946). In the Field. Norman Mailer (1923-2007). from The Armies of the Night.

Robert Bly (b. 1926). Counting Small-Boned Bodies. The Teeth Mother Naked at Last. Yusef Komunyakaa (b. 1947). Tu Do Street. Prisoners.

Thanks. Facing It. Fog Galleon. Denise Levertov (1923-1997). Overheard over S.E. Asia. In Thai Binh (Peace) Province.

Fragrance of Life, Odor of Death. A Poem at Christmas, 1972, during the Terror-Bombing of North Vietnam. Le Ly Hayslip (b. 1949). from When Heaven and Earth Changed Places. from Chapter 7, A Different View. Ralph Molina (b. ? ).

Dos Recuerdos. Paule Marshall (b. 1929). To Da-Duh, in Memoriam. Ernest J. Gaines (b. 1933). The Sky Is Gray.

N. Scott Momaday (Kiowa) (b. 1934). from The Way to Rainy Mountain. In Focus: Aesthetics and Politics of the 1960s and 1970s--Black, Brown, Yellow, Red. Larry Neal (1937-1981). Some Reflections on the Black Aesthetic. Anonymous.

White Male Qualities. Wing Tek Lum (b. 1946). Minority Poem. Ron Tanaka (1944-2007). I Hate My Wife for Her Flat Yellow Face. Combahee River Collective. A Black Feminist Statement.

Rita Sánchez (b. 1952). Chicana Writer Breaking Out of the Silence. Vine Deloria (1933-2005). from Custer Died for Your Sins. The 1970s: Decade of Disillusionment. Alice Walker (b. 1944).

Laurel. Toni Cade Bambara (1939-1995). My Man Bovanne. Rudolfo A. Anaya (b. 1937). from Bless Me, Ultima. Dieciocho.

Pedro Pietri (1944-2004). Puerto Rican Obituary. Traffic Violations. Adrienne Rich (b. 1929). Diving into the Wreck. From a Survivor. Power.

Not Somewhere Else, but Here. Coast to Coast. Frame. Ishmael Reed (b. 1938). Badman of the Guest Professor. Bitter Chocolate. James Welch (Blackfeet-Gros Ventre) (1940-2003).

from Winter in the Blood. Maxine Hong Kingston (b. 1940). No Name Woman. Jessica Hagedorn (b. 1949). The Death of Anna May Wong. Filipino Boogie.

Homesick. Donald Barthelme (1931-1989). At the End of the Mechanical Age. Audre Lorde (1934-1992). Power. Never Take Fire from a Woman. The Art of Response. Stations.

The Master''s Tools Will Never Dismantle the Master''s House. Michael S. Harper (b. 1938). Song: I Want a Witness. Nightmare Begins Responsibility. Here Where Coltrane Is. Camp Story.

In Focus: The Ojibway Nation. Diane Burns, "Sure You Can Ask Me a Personal Question." Louise Erdrich, "Dear John Wayne," "The Red Convertible." Dennis Banks, selection from Ojibway Warrior. Gerald Vizenor, "Dennis of Wounded Knee." Winona La Duke, part III ("The Occupation") from Last Standing Woman. Kim Blaeser, "Apprenticed to Justice," "''Native Americans'' vs. ''The Poets.

''" Jim Northrup, "Veterans Dance." Gordon Henry, "Arthur Boozhoo On the Nature of Magic." The 1980s: Disasters, Divestment, Diversity. Cynthia Ozick (b. 1928). The Shawl. Janice Mirikitani (b. 1942).

For My Father. Desert Flowers. Breaking Tradition. Recipe. Leslie Marmon Silko (Laguna) (b. 1948). Lullaby. Raymond Carver (1938-1988).

What We Talk about When We Talk about Love. Richard Ford (b. 1944). Rock Springs. Philip Levine (b. 1928). Coming Home, Detroit, 1968. The Rats.

The Everlasting Sunday. The Simple Truth. The Lesson. Victor Hernández Cruz (b. 1949). urban dream. Mountain Building. Table of Contents.

Simon Ortiz (Acoma Pueblo) (b. 1941). from Sand Creek. Garrett Kaoru Hongo (b. 1951). Yellow Light. Off from Swing Shift. Who among You Knows the Essence of Garlic? And Your Soul Shall Dance.

The Unreal Dwelling: My Years in Volcano. Gary Soto (b. 1952). Braly Street. The Cellar. Mexicans Begin Jogging. Black Hair. Kearney Park.

Sonia Sanchez (b. 1934). to blk/record/buyers. Masks. Just Don''t Never Give Up on Love. A Letter to Dr. Martin Luther King. Father and Daughter.

Lucille Clifton (1936-2010). the thirty eighth year. i am accused of tending to the past. at the cemetery, walnut grove plantation, south carolina, 1989. reply. in white America. June Jordan (1936-2002). Poem about My Rights.

To Free Nelson Mandela. Moving towards Home. Toni Morrison (b. 1931). Recitatif. Nicholasa Mohr (b. 1938). From Rituals of Survival.

Helena Maria Viramontes (b. 1954). The Cariboo Cafe. Grace Paley (1922--2007). The Expensive Moment. Wendy Rose (Hopi) (b. 1948). Throat Song: The Rotating Earth.

Loo-wit. To the Hopi in Richmond (Santa Fe Indian Village). If I Am Too Brown or Too White for You. Story Keeper. Julia. George C. Wolfe (b. 1952).

The Colored Museum. Pat Mora (b. 1942). Border Town: 1938. Unnatural Speech. University Avenue. Judith Ortiz Cofer (b. 1952).

Claims. The Woman Who Was Left at the Altar. My Father in the Navy: A Childhood Memory. En Mis Ojos No Hay Dias. Latin Women Pray. Tato Laviera (b. 1951). frio.

AmeRican. Latero Story. Gloria Anzaldua (1942-2004). from Borderlands / La Frontera. Ann Beattie (b. 1947). Janus. Joy Harjo (Creek) (b.

1951). The Woman Hanging from the Thirteenth Floor Window. New Orleans. Remember. Vision. Anchorage. Deer Dancer. We Must Call a Meeting.

Bobbie Ann Mason (b. 1940). Airwaves. Lorna Dee Cervantes (b. 1954). Beneath the Shadow of the Freeway. Poem for the Young White Man Who Asked Me How I, an Intelligent, Well-Read Person, Could Believe in the War between Races. Macho.

Bananas. Jamaica Kincaid (b. 1949). from A Small Place. Bharati Mukherjee (b. 1940). A Wife''s Story. Carolyn Forche (b.

1950). from The Country between Us. The Colonel. Because One Is Always Forgotten. As Children Together. from The Recording Angel. Elegy. Dorothy Allison (b.

1949). Don''t Tell Me You Don''t Know. Frank Chin (b. 1940). Railroad Standard Time. John Edgar Wideman (b. 1941). Valaida.

The 1990s: New World Disorder. Li-Young Lee (b. 1957). I Ask My Mother to Sing. My Father, in Heaven, Is Reading Out Loud. With Ruins. This Room and Everything in It. Art Spiegelman (b.

1948). Don''t Get Around Much Anymore. from Maus II. Gish Jen (b. 1955). In the American Society. Chris Ware (b. 1967).

Thrilling Adventure Stories (I Guess). Lawson Fusao Inada (b. 1938). Instructions to All Persons. Two Variations on a Theme by Thelonius Monk as Inspired by Mal Waldron. Introduction: Monk''s Prosody. I. Blue Monk (linear).

II. Blue Monk (percussive). Kicking the Habit. On Being Asian American. Lynda Barry (b. 1956). Messed Up and Confused. Help You.

Family Pictures. It''s Cool. She Wanted It, She Wanted It. If You Want to Know Teenagers by Mar Lys. Kimiko Hahn (b. 1955). Strands. Resistance: A Poem on Ikat Cloth.

Cuttings. Naomi Shihab Nye (b. 1952). Ducks. Different Ways to Pray. My Father and the Figtree. Blood. Where the Soft Air Lives.

Edwidge Danticat (b. 1969). New York Day Women. Chang-rae Lee (b. 1965). Coming Home Again. Paula Vogel (b. 1951).

How I Learne.