John Updike’s Selected Poems made the list of “10 Books We Loved in 2015” by PBS NewsHour.
“John Updike: Selected Poems,” edited by Christopher Carduff
Mike Melia, senior broadcast producer
“He’s one of the most prolific American writers, but John Updike was not known as a poet. His novels, stories and essays fill volumes. Now, there is a new collection of his verse. A highlight, for me, is ‘Endpoint,’ a series of poems written in the last years of his life. They may be my favorite things he ever wrote. Here’s a stanza from ‘Spirit of 76’:
Be with me, words, a little longer; you
have given me my quitclaim in the sun,
sealed shut my adolescent wounds, made light
of grownup troubles, turned to my advantage
what in most lives would be pure deficit,
and formed, of those I loved, more solid ghosts.