“Threnody” by William Carlos Williams
"It is not what you say that matters but the manner in which you say it; there lies the secret of the ages." - William Carlos Williams… Read More
“Meeting Point” by Louis MacNeice
"Poetry in my opinion must be honest before anything else and I refuse to be 'objective' or clear-cut at the cost of honesty." - Louis MacNeice… Read More
Works Cited: A New Poetry Podcast
It's a gritty, downright underground project right now, and I hope it catches on. I'm told they have the entire first season recorded, so we have much more to look forward to.… Read More
“Celle Qui Fut Heaulmiette” by Wallace Stevens
“After the reader has admired certain lines because Shakespeare might have written them, he begins to admire them because only Stevens could.” - Robert Fitzgerald … Read More
“Scenes from a Storm: Valentine’s Day, 2018” by Olga Dugan
Olga Dugan is a Cave Canem poet. Her award-winning poems appear or are forthcoming in Virga, The Sunlight Press, Origins, The Peacock Journal, Typehouse Literary Magazine, Kweli, The Southern Quarterly, The Red… Read More
“The Woman Turns Herself into a Fish” by Eavan Boland
"Boland pursues an important, feminist revision of the history-making so often praised or inherited by MacNeice and Heaney. Not so much outside of history as counter to it, or in the process… Read More
Monday Poets at the Free Library Featuring Catherine Staples and Ernest Hilbert
Parkway Central Library, 1901 Vine Street, Philadelphia, PA 19103… Read More
“How to Write the Great Jersey Poem” by Danny Shot
Danny Shot was a longtime publisher and editor of Long Shot arts and literary magazine, which he founded along with Eliot Katz in 1982 in New Brunswick, New Jersey. … Read More
“To Eros” by Alfonsina Storni translated from the Spanish by Nicholas Friedman
Alfonsina Storni (1892-1938) is an important Argentine and Latin-American modernist poet. Nicholas Friedman is the author of Petty Theft, which won the 2018 New Criterion Poetry Prize and will be published by… Read More
Hear Afaa M. Weaver Interviewed by Ernest Hilbert Live at Fergie’s Pub
Ernest Hilbert interviewed poet, translator, and professor Afaa M. Weaver before a live audience at Fergie's Pub in Philadelphia on the afternoon of Sunday, November 19th, 2017. … Read More
“Spirit Boxing” by Afaa M. Weaver
It is the tightness in the gut when the load is heavy enough to knock me over backward, turn me back on my heel until my ankle cracks and I holler out… Read More
Afaa Michael Weaver Interviewed Live by Ernest Hilbert
Hey, Philly, I'll be interviewing award-winning poet Afaa Michael Weaver as part of the Moonstone Gold series at Fergie's Pub, 1214 Sansom Street. Further info appears below. Hope to see you there!… Read More
“The Pardon” by Richard Wilbur
"He should be read in the company of Robert Frost and Wallace Stevens" - Harold Bloom… Read More
“Only Human” by Sammy Jay
Sammy Jay, 29, grew up in Oxford and in Ireland by the sea. He is a rare book dealer with Peter Harrington of London, and has just issued his first trade catalogue:… Read More
Don’t Miss Poets Ryan Wilson and James Matthew Wilson at the Free Library
Ryan Wilson, author of The Stranger World and James Matthew Wilson, author of Some Permanent Things at The Free Library of Philadelphia, 1901 Vine St., Room 108, Monday, October 2nd, 6:30PM… Read More
“An Afternoon at the Beach” by Edgar Bowers
"Though he was essentially a rationalist, Bowers's poems are marked by extreme aesthetic refinement and an intense feeling for the mystery of things. His teacher and friend Yvor Winters described him as… Read More
“Mid-August at Sourdough Mountain Lookout” by Gary Snyder
"As a boy I was hungry for images of wild nature, for a catalogue of landscapes, of flora and fauna, of minerals and processes, of sensory experiences. 'Pitch glows on the fir-cones'… Read More
Ernest Hilbert’s “Seasonal Drinking” in Modern Drunkard Magazine
My short poem “Seasonal Drinking” appears in the new issue of Modern Drunkard magazine, Number 61, the Adventure Issue, in the “Postcards from Skid Row” section. I subscribe, but I hadn’t yet… Read More
“Watching My Mother Take Her Last Breath” by Leon Stokesbury
"Leon Stokesbury writes with a pure and beautiful clarity, and that clarity is exacting. Whether he is elegiac or irate, magnanimous or biting, amused or exasperated, Stokesbury is always clear about what… Read More
Ernest Hilbert Reads with Austin Allen at Otto’s Shrunken Head
Come on out for a lazy Sunday afternoon Zombie, beer, or coffee and some new poetry at Otto's Shrunken Head, declared one of New York City's best venues for poetry. … Read More
“Poem Begun on the Autumn Equinox” by Ernest Hilbert
"The American lyric rendered in these poems follows Coleridge’s description of the sonnet as 'adapted to the state of a man violently agitated by a real passion.' Hilbert’s passion here is… Read More
“On the Vanity of Earthly Greatness” by Arthur Guiterman
Arthur Guiterman was born of American parents in Vienna, graduated from the College of the City of New York in 1891, and was married in 1909 to Vida Lindo. He was an… Read More
“Time is a Horse” by Christine Gelineau
Christine Gelineau is the author of three full-length collections of poetry, most recently Crave (NYQ Books, 2016), which has just been released. Her poetic sequence Appetite for the Divine was the Editor's… Read More
“Visible Spectrum” by Ernest Hilbert
“There are books of poetry that, if only readers could be induced to pick them up, might change their minds for good about the supposed incomprehensibility, preciousness, and irrelevance of modern poetry.… Read More
“Neil deGrasse Tyson” by Christopher Bullard
Chris Bullard is a native of Jacksonville, FL. He lives in Collingswood, NJ. He received his B.A. from the University of Pennsylvania and his M.F.A. from Wilkes University. Kattywompus Press published his… Read More
“The Magnet” by Thomas Stanley
"Stanley's fame was as a scholar and translator. He was the author of History of Philosophy (1655-62) and edited Aeschylus in 1663. His best know translations are those of Anacreon and of… Read More
“All the Dead Dears” by Sylvia Plath
“The fiercest poet of our time”-- Anne Stevenson… Read More
“Rhapsody on a Windy Night” by T.S. Eliot
"A thorough knowledge of Eliot is compulsory for anyone interested in contemporary literature. Whether he is liked or disliked is of no importance, but he must be read." --Northrop Frye… Read More
“Unidentified Flying Object” by Robert Hayden
"Hayden was a remembrancer, a poet of faith and superb execution, and one of the best teachers by example one can find in the poetry of the twentieth century, or in any… Read More
Recent Publications and Radio Appearances by Ernest Hilbert
Here's a brief post to advertise some things I've been doing lately. What better time to do a roundup than in the very doldrums of summer? Stay cool, if you can, and… Read More