BAP 2008

Have been reading the Best American Poetry 2008 (which should really be called Some Nice-ish American Poetry 2008). My favorites:

Ciaran Berry, Electrocuting an Elephant

Robert Hass, I am your waiter tonight and my name is Dmitri (a fairly uninspired reading of which can be heard here, at 47:45)

Bob Hicok, O my pa-pa

Susan Mitchell, Ritual

Ron Padgett, Method, or Kenneth Koch (which I can't find online, alas, but see Padgett's other poems in The Sienese Shredder - a journal I'll confess I'd never heard of before)

Alberto Rios, The Rain that Falls Here

John Rybicki, Three Lanterns

Alan Sullivan, Divide and Conquer

***

The thing that always strikes me about the BAP is how much American Poetry as defined by it as an old person's game. Here's the age distribution of the 75 poets appearing in the 2008 volume:

Under 30: 2
30 - 35: 5
35 - 40: 8
40 - 45: 3
45 - 50: 6
50 - 55: 6
55 - 60: 18
60 - 65: 9
65 - 70: 7
70 - 75: 5
Over 75: 6

Don't get me wrong - I'm not saying this is necessarily a bad thing. Some of the people in that 55-60 bracket are among my favorite poets writing today. But I can't help feeling that this would be a more exciting franchise if it published more work by younger poets, even at the cost of leaving some of the old reliables out. If nothing else, it would make the book more useful.