Making Your Own Days: The Pleasures of Reading and Writing Poetry

I appreciated the novel approach of the author who distinguished poetry as a separate language in his discussion of the nature of poetry. His clear prose and use of examples from great poems helped make this a rich source for both those new to poetry and more experienced poetry lovers.

This is a wonderful book and about as kind and wise a book as you could find about what it means to write poetry and why. While the book trends towards more classicism in its second half it is , as the writer was, an extraordinarily generous description of the art by one of its great practitioners. If you are of a short attention span read the first four chapters. It is also well written which is not, from experience, something one can be sure of even though the writing is about writing.