The Best American Poetry 1988, the first volume in The Best American Poetry series, was edited by David Lehman and by guest editor John Ashbery, who chose one of his own poems among the group of 75.
Lehman's forward Although Lehman would later use his forewords as a kind of "state of poetry" review of the previous year, in this first volume he concentrated on the nature of this anthology, with most of the foreword given over to explaining the mechanics of the process (see The Best American Poetry series for those comments).
There seem to be plenty of creative writing programs, so it appears there will be an audience for the series, Lehman wrote, and with poetry appearing in so many different publications, an annual anthology could help readers find poetry in one place.
Poets and poems included
Poet Poem Where poem previously appeared A. R. Ammons "Motion Which Disestablishes Organizes Everything" The Hudson Review Ralph Angel "Shadow Play" Poetry Rae Armantrout "Bases" o•blék John Ash "Memories of Italy" Disbelief John Ashbery "One Coat of Paint" Shenandoah Ted Berrigan "My Autobiography" New American Writing Mei-mei Berssenbrugge "Chinese Space" Conjunctions George Bradley "Noch Einmal, an Orpheus" Grand Street Stefan Brecht "Momentariness" Tyuonyi Joseph Brodsky "To Urania" The Paris Review Nicholas Christopher "Miranda inReno" The New Republic Marc Cohen "Mecox Road" Verse Wanda Coleman "Essay on Language" Heavy Daughter Blues Clark Coolidge "A Monologue" o•blék Alfred Corn "New Year" Partisan Review Douglas Crase "Dog Star Sale" The Paris Review Robert Creeley "The Dream" Exquisite Corpse Thomas M. Disch "In Memoriam" Boulevard Kenward Elmslie "Top O' Silo" Conjunctions Alice Fulton "Losing It" Epoch Amy Gerstler "marriage" New American Writing Jorie Graham "On Difficulty" The End of Beauty Debora Greger "Snow White and Rose Red" The New Yorker Allen Grossman "The Piano Player Explains Himself" Grand Street Barbara Guest "Words" Tyuonyi Rachel Hadas "Nourishment" Boulevard Donald Hall "Prophecy" The Paris Review Robert Hass "Thin Air" Antaeus Seamus Heaney "A Shooting Script" American Poetry Review Anthony Hecht "Envoi" The Yale Review Gerrit Henry "The Confessions of Gerrit" Mudfish John Hollander "An Old Story is Retold" Partisan Review Richard Howard "The Foreigner Remembered by a Local Man" For Nelson Mandela Donald Justice "Nostalgia of the Lakefronts" Antaeus Robert Kelly "Hercules Musarum" Tyuonyi Kevin Killiam "Pasolini" Shiny International August Kleinzahler "Soda Water with a Boyhood Friend" New American Writing Caroline Knox "Movement Along the Frieze" New American Writing Kenneth Koch "What People Say About Paris" Poetry John Koethe "Mistral" The Paris Review Philip Lamantia "Unachieved" Sulfur Ann Lauterbach "Psyche's Dream" Before Recollection David Lehman "Operation Memory" Shenandoah Philip Levine "A Walk with Tom Jefferson" The Paris Review Nathaniel Mackey "Degree Four" Conjunctions Michael Malinowitz "Funeral March for a Papagallo" Aerial Tom Mandel "Hungry and Waiting" Sulfur Harry Mathews "Histoire" Armenian Papers Bernadette Mayer "Holding the Thought of Love" Exquisite Corpse James Merrill "Farewell Performance" Grand Street Eileen Myles "Public Television" Shiny International A. L. Nielson "Route E" Aerial Ron Padgett "Light As Air" Boulevard Michael Palmer "From C" o•blék Bob Perelman "Politics" o•blék Robert Pinsky "The Hearts" The New Republic Donald Revell "St. Lucy's Day" Poetry Joe Ross "From Act I, Scene II of Guards of the Heart" 'Aerial Leslie Scalapino "Jumping-jack flash" Conjunctions James Schuyler "Let's All Hear It for Mildred Bailey!" Poetry David Shapiro "Empathy for David Winfield" Diamonds are Forever: Artists and Writers on BaseballCharles Simic "St Thomas Aquinas" Antaeus Gary Snyder "Walking the New York Bedrock Alive in the Sea of Information" Sulfur Ruth Stone "The Latest Hotel Guest Walks Over Particles That Revolve in Seven Other Dimensions Controlling Latticed Space" American Poetry Review May Swenson "Dummy, 51, to Go to Museum. Ventriloquist Dead at 75" In Other Words James Tate "Neighbors" Sonora Review Lydia Tomkiw "Six of Ox Is" New American Writing Derek Walcott "Elsewhere" The Arkansas Testament Rosanne Wasserman "Inuit and Seal" Sulfur Marjorie Welish "Respected, Feared, and Somehow Loved" o•blék Susan Wheeler "What Memory Reveals" Sulfur Richard Wilbur "Trolling for Blues" Poetry Alan Williamson "Recitation for Dismantling the Hydrogen Bomb" American Poetry Review John Yau "Genghis Chan: Private Eye" Sulfur Geoffrey Young "Drive, It Said" New American Writing
See also 1988 in poetry
External links Web page for contents of the book, with links to each publication where the poems originally appeared