I only know of Christian Wiman as the editor of Poetry magazine for the past few years. He took what was a high-quality but old-fashioned journal and turned it into something current and engaging; it now feels like a poetry-world sibling of The Believer.

Since writing the list on that other thread I've discovered James Tate's Return to the City of White Donkeys -- more like short stories than poems, but unpredictible, funny, some of them stunning. (edit: Andrew said Tate too while I was writing this) I actually read some of the poems out loud in the company of a gal who had cooked me dinner, and it was the most satisfying thing. (Google has much of the book copied here --
http://books.google.com/books?id=OoioLM ... &ct=result
-- scroll to "Never Enough Darts" or "The Rally".)

Also, Leigh Stein only has chapbooks and individual poems published so far, but if she keeps going she could be a major poet. Here's one of hers.

I'm a big fan of Anselm Berrigan's recent stuff.

The Flarf movement is pretty interesting.

I agree completely about Charles Bernstein. Watch everything here.

You might can tell the Pennsound page is very, very deep. Also, try ubu web, which I think is still run by one of my favorite contemporary poets, Kenny Goldsmith.

None of this is that neo-traditionalist crap, either. This is the real thing.

Oh jesus, how cold I forget Jaap Blonk!?

This is truly one of the most important poems of the last 15 or 20 decades. To see him read it is to witness a large man turn very, very red and gag himself nearly unconscious. I am not kidding.

Robert Penn Warren was America's first poet laureate, and if you can find a decent anthology of his work there's a lot to be said for him.

esp. check out "Encounter With Old Nigger On the Side of the Road".

Great poem.

J.H. Prynne

Chris Abani:
www.chrisabani.com

Gregory Corso
Antler
C.K. Williams
Tony Hoagland

thanks for the suggestions so far guys. i'll report back with my findings/likes.

PLEASE: Jonathan Williams and everything related from his Jargon Society press. He died earlier this year and I was very sad. A huge inspiration.

I second the suggestions of Elizabeth Bishop, James Tate, and August Kleinzahler. Kleinzahler is really owed his due. He has a better ear than nearly every other living free-verse writer. Red Sauce, Whiskey, and Snow and Green Sees Things in Waves are good places to start.

With Tate, I'd stick with either his earliest or most recent books; the middle-period poems can be a bit homogeneous. (That said, I'm a bit behind on Tate's most recent books.)

Donald Justice and Richard Wilbur are also fantastic. Wilbur has written quite a bit, however, and I don't know of any good places to start. I don't believe that he's published a volume of selected poems, but he should! Justice has written far less and may be a bit more accessible.

I'd skip French surrealism. The South Americans did it much better. Especially good is Rafael Alberti. Mark Strand has some wonderful translations of Alberti.

One name I haven't seen mentioned yet is James Wright. He died a couple of decades ago, but he's still pretty contemporary. Of all the names I've seen suggested thus far (except for modernists like Bishop and Stevens), he's probably my favorite of the bunch. I'll see if I can dig up some samples.

Mark Levine is also quite good.