Great collection, in which you can see Auden's growth from a fairly dull symbolist/modernist type to something much more interesting, as his poetry gains in both clarity and depth. Personal favorites are XXI, XXVI and XXXVII from 1938-39; XVII from 1933, XXIV and XXV from 1929, and especially sonnet XXV from the sequence 'In Time of War:

Nothing is given: we must find our law.
Great buildings jostle in the sun for
domination
Behind them stretch like sorry vegetation
The low recessive houses of the poor.

We have no destiny assigned us:
Nothing is certain but the body; we plan
To better ourselves; the hospitals alone
remind us
Of the equality of man.

Children are really loved here, even by
police:
They speak of years before the big were
lonely
And will be lost.

And only
The brass bands throbbing in the parks
foretell
Some future reign of happiness and peace.

We learn to pity and rebel. ( )