Billy Collins : I found his work first in a terrific anthology called “Staying Alive” , Bloodaxe Books, particularly a poem called “The Dead“ , placed , as it happens , right after another old favourite , “Buffalo Bill’s“ by E.E.Cummings. Eerything else of his I found shared the same qualities…..quiet, undemonstrative, but funny, and haunting, leaving you with a glowing sense of wonder wrought mysteriously. How does he DO that ?  He has been U.S Poet Laureate, but don’t let that put you off.

Let me quote a stanza from a poem called “ Nostalgia “ that sums him up for me.

 

      

 

 

 

     

- Billy Collins Animated Poems
- Billy Collins Biography
- Collection of poems by Billy Collins