Selecting a Reader

“Selecting a Reader” illustrates Ted Kooser’s participation in a movement that aims to demystify poetry. Along with other American poets like Billy Collins and Dana Gioia, Kooser writes poems for people who are not academics nor poets themselves. “Selecting a Reader” demonstrates Kooser’s awareness of how small space poetry actually occupies in American culture. He knocks poetry off its pedestal, as his speaker imagines the woman placing the book back on the shelf and choosing a clean raincoat over a book of poems.

In an interview with Reunion, Kooser notes that many poets “think more about expressing themselves than inviting readers into what one writes” ("Drawn to the Ordinary World: An Interview with Former U.S. Poet Laureate Ted Kooser." Reunion, 2006). As with Collins and Gioia, Kooser practices a poetics that prioritizes self-expression that recenters the reader. Whereas modernist poets like Wallace Stevens (1879-1955) and postmodern poets like John Ashbery (1927-2017) create dense, code-like poems, Kooser strives to produce simple work that does not require a guide or an advanced degree.

Kooser’s poem is a part of a larger canon of poems created from images of disparate women. In “Selecting a Reader,” Kooser presents a crisp and sharp picture of the woman character, describing her damp hair, her raincoat, and her financial strain. Many other canonized poets take inspiration from imperfect women. William Carlos Williams’s “To a Poor Old Woman” (c. 1935) describes an elderly lady eating a delicious plum out of a paper bag on the street. In Allen Ginsberg’s long poem Kaddish (1957-1959), the poet presents a disquieting image of his mother on her bed by calling attention to her physical scars.