In celebration of National Poetry Month, I’ve selected works by incredible poets whose words inspire, challenge and uplift. Among them is Ariana Reines, a UCBC alum, whose last book of poetry, The Sand Book, won the Kingsley Tufts Poetry Award. These books will be hidden on Saturday, April 26, starting at 11 a.m. in Norwood — so mark your calendars! Stay tuned for clues and coordinates. Happy hunting!
The Rose of Flesh by Ariana Reines
Ariana Reines’ The Rose is a collection that hums with both raw vulnerability and razor-sharp wit. It’s poetry that isn’t afraid to get its hands dirty, digging deep into the paradoxes of power, surrender and the tangled mess of desire. Reines strips away pretense, confronting gender, eroticism and suffering with an intensity that feels almost ritualistic. Her exploration of masculine pain through a deeply feminine lens is both unsettling and hypnotic — there’s a push and pull, a dance between dominance and submission that threads through every line.
There’s a sly humor beneath the surface of The Rose that keeps the collection from feeling weighed down by its own gravity. It moves between the sacred and the profane with an undercurrent of violent sensuality. Love and war, sex and mysticism, power and fragility — these are the tensions that pulse at the heart of this book. It’s a collection that doesn’t just ask to be read; it demands to be felt, to be reckoned with.
For readers of: Olena Kalytiak Davis, Anne Carson, Eileen Myles
Graywolf Press ᐧ 96 pages ᐧ April 15, 2025
Jailbreak of Sparrows by Martín Espada
Martín Espada’s Jailbreak of Sparrows is a testament to the power of poetry to bear witness, to remember and to demand justice. Each poem pulses with a deep sense of humanity, whether he’s illuminating moments of everyday resilience or unearthing histories that refuse to be erased. Espada’s language is rich and musical, carrying the weight of struggle and survival while never losing sight of beauty. His work is both personal and political, seamlessly weaving intimate memories with broader social commentary, from the colonial violence in Puerto Rico to the tragic injustices faced by migrants.
Espada can transform the smallest details or events — an old photograph, a minor league baseball game, a bat with vertigo — into something monumental. His poems insist that we stop and look, not just at the past but at the present, at the forces shaping our world, at the lives too often overlooked. Jailbreak of Sparrows is a moving collection that reminds us of poetry’s role in preserving memory and igniting change.
For readers of: Juan Felipe Herrera, Ada Limón, Natalie Diaz
Knopf ᐧ 128 pages ᐧ April 1, 2025
Ecstasy by Alex Dimitrov
Alex Dimitrov’s Ecstasy is a fever dream of poetry — reckless, rapturous and utterly alive. His words pulse with a restless hunger, capturing the thrill of desire, the fleeting nature of pleasure and the existential ache that lingers beneath it all. Reading this collection felt like being swept into a neon-lit night, where sex, love and longing blur into something intoxicating and deeply human. Dimitrov refuses to soften his edges or offer easy conclusions; instead, his poems revel in contradiction — hedonism and holiness, euphoria and emptiness, intimacy and isolation.
Dimitrov’s voice is simultaneously defiant and vulnerable, like someone standing at the edge of the world, unafraid to jump. He could be contemplating poetry in the dim light of a bathroom stall or surrendering to the sensory overload of a new romance, and there’s an urgency in his language that feels both deeply personal and universal. Ecstasy is a fearless celebration of life in all its messy, electrifying beauty.
For readers of: Frank O’Hara, Richard Siken, Danez Smith
Knopf ᐧ 112 pages ᐧ April 1, 2025
This article appears in Apr 9-15, 2025.
