The Best of the Best American Poetry 1988-1997, a volume in The Best American Poetry series, was edited by David Lehman and by guest editor Harold Bloom, who chose the poems.
Bloom selected poems from every entry in the series through 1997, with the exception of the 1996 volume, edited by Adrienne Rich. Bloom criticized the 1996 issue in his introductory essay, claiming that Rich had selected poems based on the "race, gender, sexual orientation, ethnic origin, and political purpose of the would-be poet", rather than on aesthetic merit . Lehman wrote in his own introductory essay that he believed a number of Rich's selections would have met Bloom's criteria, and that he disagreed with Bloom's decision to exclude any poems from Rich's editorship .
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The Boston Review printed Bloom's preface and in the following issue included responses from, among others, Mark Doty, Ann Lauterbach, Rita Dove, J. D. McClatchy, Donald Revell, Heather McHugh, Thylias Moss, Reginald Shepherd, Carol Muske, Sven Birkerts, and Marjorie Perloff.[1]
Of "Best of" anthologies generally, JoAnn Gutin wrote in Salon.com, "Those who pride themselves on the catholicity or adventurousness of their reading tastes may well take a dim view of the 'Best of' boom. I can envision intellectuals saying, with a certain hauteur, 'I would never allow someone to choose what I read.' These are probably the same people who ask for menu substitutions in nice restaurants...or who walk around looking like the wrath of God under the impression that they have a 'personal style.' My position is, if it's good enough for John Updike or Joyce Carol Oates or Harold Bloom, it's good enough for me" [2].
| Poet | Poem | Edition year in which poem previously appeared |
| Jonathan Aaron | "Dance Mania" | 1992 |
| A. R. Ammons | "Anxiety's Prosody " | 1989 |
| A. R. Ammons | "Garbage" | 1993 |
| A. R. Ammons | from "Strip"" | 1997 |
| John Ashbery | "Baked Alaska" | 1993 |
| John Ashbery | "Myrtle" | 1994 |
| John Ashbery | "The Problem of Anxiety" | 1997 |
| Elizabeth Bishop | "It is Marvellous . . ." | 1989 |
| George Bradley | "The Fire Fetched Down" | 1994 |
| Lucie Brock-Broido | "Inevitably, She Declined" | 1992 |
| Anne Carson | "The Life of Towns" | 1990 |
| Amy Clampitt | "My Cousin Muriel" | 1990 |
| Douglas Crase | "True Solar Holiday" | 1989 |
| Carolyn Creedon | "litany" | 1993 |
| Thomas M. Disch | "The Cardinal Detoxes: A Play in One Act" | 1994 |
| Irving Feldman | "Terminal Laughs" | 1995 |
| Aaron Fogel | "The Printers Error" | 1995 |
| Alice Fulton | "Powers of Congress" | 1989 |
| Allen Ginsberg | "Salutations to Fernando Pessoa" | 1995 |
| Louise Glück | "Celestial Music" | 1991 |
| Louise Glück | "Vespers" | 1992 |
| Jorie Graham | "Manifest Destiny" | 1992 |
| Jorie Graham | "What the Instant Contains" | 1993 |
| Allen Grossman | "The Piano Player Explains Himself" | 1988 |
| Donald Hall | "Prophecy" | 1988 |
| Donald Hall | "The Porcelain Couple" | 1997 |
| Vicki Hearne | "St. Luke Painting the Virgin" | 1992 |
| Anthony Hecht | "Prospects" | 1995 |
| Edward Hirsch | "Man on a Fire Escape" | 1992 |
| John Hollander | "Kinneret" | 1989 |
| John Hollander | "An Old-Fashioned Song" | 1990 |
| John Hollander | "The See-Saw" | 1991 |
| Richard Howard | "Like Most Revelations" | 1992 |
| Donald Justice | "Nostalgia of the Lakefronts" | 1988 |
| Donald Justice | "Invitation to a Ghost" | 1993 |
| Brigit Pegeen Kelly | "The White Pilgrim: Old Christian Cemetery" | 1993 |
| Jane Kenyon | "Three Songs at the End of the Summer" | 1989 |
| Galway Kinnell | "When One Has Lived a Long Time Alone" | 1990 |
| Karl Kirchwey | "Sonogram" | 1995 |
| Kenneth Koch | "One Train May Hide Another" | 1994 |
| Yusef Komunyakaa | "Facing It" | 1990 |
| Ann Lauterbach | "Psyches Dream" | 1988 |
| Philip Levine | "Scouting" | 1990 |
| Harry Matthews | "Histoire" | 1988 |
| J. D. McClatchy | "An Essay on Friendship" | 1991 |
| James Merrill | "Family Week at Oracle Ranch" | 1994 |
| James Merrill | "The 'Ring' Cycle" | 1991 |
| James Merrill | "A Room at the Heart of Things" | 1989 |
| W.S. Merwin | "The Stranger" | 1993 |
| Susan Mitchell | "Havana Birth" | 1990 |
| A. F. Moritz | "Protracted Episode" | 1991 |
| Thylias Moss | "The Warmth of Hot Chocolate" | 1989 |
| Brighde Mullins | "At the Lakehouse" | 1994 |
| Molly Peacock | "Have You Ever Faked an Orgasm?" | 1995 |
| Bob Perelman | "Movie" | 1989 |
| Carl Phillips | "A Mathematics of Breathing" | 1994 |
| Kay Ryan | "Outsider Art" | 1995 |
| Grace Schulman | "The Present Perfect" | 1995 |
| David Shapiro | "The Seasons" | 1991 |
| Charles Simic | "Country Fair" | 1991 |
| Charles Simic | "The Something" | 1997 |
| Gary Snyder | "Ripples on the Surface" | 1993 |
| Mark Strand | "Reading in Place" | 1989 |
| Mark Strand | from "Dark Harbor" | 1993 |
| Mark Strand | "Morning, Noon, and Night" | 1997 |
| May Swenson | "Sleeping with Boa" | 1994 |
| Derek Walcott | "Omeros" | 1991 |
| Rosanna Warren | "The Cormorant" | 1990 |
| Rosanna Warren | "Diversion" | 1997 |
| Susan Wheeler | "What Memory Reveals" | 1988 |
| Richard Wilbur | "Lying" | 1997 |
| Richard Wilbur | "A Wall in the Woods: Cummington" | 1990 |
| Charles Wright | "Disjecta Membra" | 1997 |
| Jay Wright | "Madrid" | 1989 |
| Jay Wright | "The Cradle Logic of Autumn" | 1995 |
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