Congratulations to the recipients of the Kenneth Koch Poetry Prize in honor of our 100th volume: Mackenzie Turgeon CC’21 for her poem “American Studies for Black Kids” and Morgan Levine CC’22 for her poem “Ballad for O’Keefe Finding an Angel in a Canyon.”
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From December, 2018
100th Volume Retrospective: Happy Autumn Fields by John Ashbery
John Ashbery won the Pulitzer Prize, the National Book Award, and many other prizes. This poem was published by the Review over twenty years after he had earned his M.A. from Columbia. Happy Autumn Fields by John Ashbery I call it (though I’m no authority)The big syndrome, of when everythingLies down together. The pointed roofsThat called…
100th Volume Retrospective: from “Dakar Doldrums” by Allen Ginsberg
At Columbia University, Ginsberg, Kerouac, and other beat poets got to know each other. Many of them were published in the Review. from “Dakar Doldrums” by Allen Ginsberg IV Twenty days have drifted in the wakeOf this slow aged ship that carries coalFrom Texas to Dakar. I, for the sakeOf little but my causelessness of…
100th Volume Retrospective: Choruses by John Hollander
John Hollander was an eminent poet, scholar, and critic. He has written numerous poetry collections, the first of which won the Yale Series of Younger Poets Award. He is also known for his 1981 book Rhyme’s Reason: A Guide to English Verse. Choruses by John Hollander I (The crumbling days and the hard cold nightsAre flickering,…
100th Volume Retrospective: On a Terrace of Nails by Mark Statman
Today we return to prose with this work by Mark Statman. Since being published in the Columbia Review, he has published four of his own poetry collections and translated poetry from Spanish. On a Terrace of Nails by Mark Statman I. Open Traffic These are gray bricks outside the window, moving in and pouring themselves…
100th Volume Retrospective: Untitled by Kate Farrell
Kate Farrell has taught poetry in nursing homes, in public schools, and at Columbia. She has published multiple books, including poetry anthologies coauthored with Kenneth Koch. Untitled by Kate Farrell Most of all, her hairsmells like shampoocatching on shouldersthen waves dark brownnearly to her waist.Her neck is so straight, and thin that onecan imagine her…
100th Volume Retrospective: Albuquerque by Frank Lima
Frank Lima had already published his own poetry collections by the time this poem was published in the Review. He received an MFA from Columbia. Albuquerque by Frank Lima The air moved across the sky like a giant as three men escaped into the desert. They became the figures of intimacy, like the mountain tops.…
100th Volume Retrospective: Perfect Timing by Diane Mehta
Diane Mehta is a freelance journalist and writer. She has previously published a book on writing poetry, and her debut poetry collection, Forest with Castanets, will be published in 2019. Perfect Timing by Diane Mehta Imagine a moving train that gathers velocity in increasing intervals of distance and time, wind blowing from the northwest at…
100th Volume Retrospective: Nature Mort by Jim Jarmusch
Jim Jarmusch, a former editor of The Columbia Review, is a director, screenwriter, and actor. He won the Caméra d’Or prize at the 1984 Cannes Film Festival for his first major film Stranger than Paradise. Most recently, his film Paterson was in competition for the Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival in 2016. Nature Mort by Jim Jarmusch the…
100th Volume Retrospective: Abraham’s Tent by Paul Spike
Today we have our first prose piece in the retrospective series. It was written by Paul Spike, now known best for his memoir Photographs of my Father, which he published six years after this was printed in our magazine. Abraham’s Tent by Paul Spike Abraham was not the clock on the wall of his…