Poetry

Necessary acts of lyric ingenuity. Worlds made live through surprise.

Danielle Mckinney, Mercy (detail), featured in AGNI 103

Featured

The Head of Goliath

And like Caravaggio, I am my own savior
rent by my own hand. Depicted:

A younger version of the painter heeds

Fuckery

Poetry by Hayan Charara

A year or two ago
I drove my car
to one of the half-dozen
places I go and a spider

“Poet-pig who knows me . . .”

Poetry by Hilda Hilst Translated from the Portuguese by Justin Greene

Poet-pig who knows me, in the blindness, in the bog
Waiting for Your Hunger, allow me to ask you
Lord of pigs and men:
Did you hear it by chance, or were you aware

Annunciation, Part III

Poetry by Talin Tahajian

Saint Leonard of Noblac, d. 559,
With your codex skin
And shark-meat ass, you are here
Floating in the cold air like blood, you are

What the Poet Taught Me

Blog post by Rachel Basch

In memory of Baron Wormser, February 4, 1948–October 7, 2025. The subject line of the email read “Bad news.” It was late September 2025, and Baron and I were scheduled to teach a weekend writing workshop together in early October. At first, I figured “bad news” meant a scheduling conflict . . .

A Minibus of Volunteers

Poetry by Dmitry Blizniuk Translated from the Ukrainian by Sergey Gerasimov

The mood: Titanic tickets burn against your chest,
and still you cannot help but sail.
Soon this land is going to sink as well.
The question is—who’s first?

Portfolio

A Portfolio of British and Irish Poems

A 2006 snapshot of new work “indicative of trends in Britain and Ireland: a lively breadth of language, and a seriousness that eschews pretension.” Alice Oswald, Simon Armitage, & other AGNI debuts.

This planet loves insistence: people forgive
For acts they can’t remember. There’s been

No true dominion. I try to lose details as quickly
As possible. Fingers of land crumple into seagrass. The sun
Burns in the water.

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