Richard Blanco’s How to Love a Country is poetic, poignant, and patriotic. Whether writing about his own history as an immigrant, his own gender identity as gay, his own grief on gun violence, Blanco’s poems are all about America as a work in progress. After reading this collection, I could see why Obama selected Blanco as the fifth Presidential Inaugural Poet.

Rae Armantrout is a master of minimalist. Her poems are concise and economical. She wastes no word and she leaves plenty of whitespace on the page. I read the Finalist collection twice and enjoyed the pieces each time. My personal favorites are “The Test” and “Late Remark.”

Tarriona “Tank” Ball is indeed Vulnerable AF. In this collection, she reflects on her past relationships and her realness came through on the page. You can feel her heartbreaks, emotions, and infatuations. “Expectations,” “Sudden Truth,” and of course “The Ass” are some of my favorites.

Simone White’s ex-husband called her an “ignorant fucker” because she “will not support any white people with [her] work.” Her poems explores critical theory, motherhood, trap music, and sexual freedom. The collection is a captivating read.

Medlin’s 808 & Otherworlds is a vibrant, pulsating, stunning collection on hip-hop, racism, and Blackness. Their response to Kanye West’s “400 years of slavery sounds like a choice,” is candid and critical. If you love hip-hop, you will enjoy Medlin’s lyrical poetry.

Bates’s thrilling debut collection begins with “The Dog.” An image of a dog stuck on a lease outside of the door as the train pulls away can’t escape my mind. Bates’s writing is dark and intimate. “Conversation with Mary” is one of my personal favorites. Quite a read.

I dig the bold typographic treatment on the cover of the book. The collection is about the beauty of the ordinary. Koethe writes about poetry and use the analogy of poetry in his poems. The first poem in the collection titled “What Was Poetry?” I also love the last one titled “A Way of Putting It,” in which he ends with:

Instead of reaching a conclusion, getting old is a study in tone
That leaves you where you are—still listening to yourself
A lifetime away from where you started, and not far from home.

Whether writing about the loss of his son, the revenge of his father, or the sweet sound of Benny Goodman’s clarinet, B.H. Fairchild brings out the extraordinary of the ordinary life on the page with lyrical emotion. I didn’t understand every piece in the collection, but the ones I did I loved them.

I don’t have a clue what I had read. Mlinko’s poems are way beyond my limited comprehension of poetry. I read the entire collection twice and couldn’t pick out one for my blog. It’s definitely not her; it’s me.

A lovely collection from a Korean-American poet who received an MFA and PhD in poetry. I like the way she incorporates Korean characters into English even though I don’t know the words. My favorite pieces includes “The Symmetry of Fish,” “My Bed Shakes and I Assume the Ghosts Are Finally Getting Me,” and of course, “Remember This When You’re Hungry.”