The Four Seasons: Poems

by J.D. McClatchy (Editor)

For the poet, even the most minute details of the natural world are starting points for flights of the imagination, and the pages of this collection celebrating the four seasons are brimming with an extraordinary range of observation and imagery. 

Here are poets past and present, from Chaucer, Shakespeare, and Wordsworth to Whitman, Dickinson, and Thoreau, from Keats, Blake, and Hopkins to Elizabeth Bishop, Ted Hughes, Amy Clampitt, Mary Oliver, and W. S. Merwin. Here are poems that speak of the seasons as measures of earthly time or as states of mind or as the physical expressions of the ineffable. From Robert Frost’s tribute to the evanescence of spring in “Nothing Gold Can Stay” to Langston Hughes’s moody “Summer Night” in Harlem, from the “stopped woods” in Marie Ponsot’s “End of October” to the chilling “mind of winter” in Wallace Stevens’s “The Snow Man,” the poems in this volume engage vividly with the seasons and, through them, with the ways in which we understand and engage the world outside ourselves.

Genres: Poetry, Classics, Nature, Nonfiction, Collections

256 pages, Hardcover

First published May 1, 2008

About the author

McClatchy is an adjunct professor at Yale University and editor of the Yale Review. He also edits the "Voice of the Poet" series for Random House AudioBooks.

His book Hazmat (Alfred A. Knopf, 2002) was nominated for the 2003 Pulitzer Prize. He has written texts for musical settings, including eight opera libretti, for such composers as Elliot Goldenthal, Daron Hagen, Lowell Liebermann, Lorin Maazel, Tobias Picker, Ned Rorem, Bruce Saylor, and William Schuman. His honors include an Award in Literature from the American Academy of Arts and Letters (1991). He has also been one of the New York Public Literary Lions, and received the 2000 Connecticut Governor’s Arts Award.

In 1999, he was elected into the membership of The American Academy of Arts and Letters, and in January 2009 he was elected president. He is a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and has received fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation (1987), the National Endowment for the Arts, and the Academy of American Poets (1991). He served as Chancellor of the Academy of American Poets from 1996 until 2003. (Wikipedia)

Reviews

[Ruby Granger · Rating 5 out of 5]

A truly wonderful collection of poems. One of my favourites.

[Connie G · Rating 4 out of 5]

"The Four Seasons: Poems" is a delightful group of 153 poems which look at the natural world as it goes through spring, summer, autumn, and winter. The 81 poets featured ranged from the past (such as Chaucer and Shakespeare) to recent times (with W.S. Merwin, Mary Oliver, and Ted Hughes). I'm including two of the shortest poems about the lovely season of autumn.

November Night
by Adelaide Crapsey

Listen …
With faint dry sound,
Like steps of passing ghosts,
The leaves, frost-crisp’d, break from the trees
And fall.

Autumn
by Amy Lowell

All day I have watched the purple vine leaves
Fall into the water.
And now in the moonlight they still fall,
But each leaf is fringed with silver.

[Anna P (whatIreallyRead) · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a collection of poems about each season of the year. Most of them were classics - the anthology included poems by Robert Frost, Emily Dickinson, Mary Oliver, William Shakespeare, Emily Bronte, Thomas Hardy, Walt Whitman, Robert Browning, E.E. Cummings, John Keats, etc. There were also many poets whose names were unfamiliar to me.

For the listener, who listens in the snow,
And, nothing himself, beholds
Nothing that is not there and the nothing that is.

It was quite enjoyable and easy to read. I read a season a day - and that was pacing myself.

One thing that called for improvement: there were no years listed for any of the poems — neither the publication years of poems nor the authors' years of life. So for unfamiliar poets, there was no context for me to place them in.

[Marieke · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent collection of seasonal poems. There's something for everyone in here. You will connect with some and you will feel very distanced from others, but I'm sure you can find something to your liking in here. To me, this was the perfect way of discovering which poets I want to read more of and which I should probably leave in the bookstores. Also, I found the autumn and winter poems very warming and comforting, as they are the seasons I struggle with the most. It appears that everyone agrees on the beauty of October and the winter months, yet no one can seem to write a positive poem on November. Is November the cursed month, then? If you ever find a poem describing the 'beauty' of November, please send it to yours truly.

[Angie Rhodes · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved dipping into this, poems for every season, Spring Summer Autumn and Winter. One of my favourite poems is in here too : Nothing Gold Can​ Stay
Nature's first green is gold,
Her hardest hue to hold.
Her early leaf s a flower,
But only so an hour.
Then leaf subsidies to leaf.
So Eden sank to grief.
So dawn goes down to day.
Nothing gold can stay.
Robert Frost.

[Christina · Rating 3 out of 5]

The book is split into seasons and I read each section during its respective season. Highly recommend reading it that way, there was just something so pleasant about the experience.

[Ellè · Rating 3 out of 5]

I usually enjoy poems but this particular book I struggled to understand a lot of them due to the majority of them being too descriptive and cryptic. I can appreciate the good writing of a poem and the selection they picked but this book wasn’t for me and I read it alongside other books a little bit per today as a refresher. In total I found I liked a maximum of the 15 poems but that was just personal preference.

[Hannah Jayne · Rating 4 out of 5]

❤️

[Elisabeth · Rating 4 out of 5]

Measuring this against other poetry collections I've read, this is probably among my favorites. There's just something to be said for a collection that features different authors, formats, and foci of the poems (though all relate to the seasons). Very enjoyable!

[Anca · Rating 5 out of 5]

4.5/5☆

[Krystie Herndon · Rating 5 out of 5]

Since the first poem I ever wrote, in third grade--"Winter Wonderland" (not very good)--I have always considered the four seasons to be THE quintessential material for poetry. Contemplating the seasons, in their ever-changing hues and attitudes, makes us human beings think about our own lives, and about God, and what He has made us to be and to do. Such a book rejuvenates me!

[Natalie (CuriousReader) · Rating 2 out of 5]

I actually started reading this last summer, and have been reading the poems seasonally - as is befitting with the theme of the collection. I'm still unused to reading poetry - and knew few names of whom I enjoy their poetry style which is why collections like this is so useful. From reading this collection it seems the one I clicked with the most was Robert Frost (poems such as "Nothing gold can stay", and "Afterflakes").

[Liz Rizzo · Rating 3 out of 5]

After greatly enjoying Poems of the Sea, which was also edited by J.D. McClatchy, I decided to pick up another Everyman's Library Pocket Poets book to enjoy. The Four Seasons seemed like the perfect choice, but I found Autumn to be so interminable that in order to finish reading the book I skipped ahead to Winter and then came back this fall to plough through a selection of LONG poems about autumn that I, for the most part, did not enjoy. I think a challenge of a collection such as this is if someone like say, Henry David Thoreau, wrote a poem about fall then it's going to be included, perhaps particularly due to significance within the history of poetry reasons, but oof, I found many of the longer autumn poems painful. Admittedly, I am not a lover of long poems in general. And perhaps the topic of seasons simply turned out to not be as innately engaging to me as the sea. Certainly the book contains many absolute poetry gems and poets I am glad to have discovered, which is the joy of a collection such as this.

[Mack Blackburn · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is my personal favorite small-volume multi-author poetry collection. It's heavy on a lot of my favorites (Richard Wilbur, Emily Dickinson, Gerard Manley Hopkins, Anthony Hecht) and focused on vivid descriptions of both the natural and human worlds in various stages of life.

I appreciate the intro: how the seasons as a topic cover everything from the movement of the Earth around the sun, weather and climate, the rebirth and decay of environments, agriculture and harvests, seasonal holidays, and even stages of human lives.

Also gave me more appreciation of Robert Frost who I previously didn't like much.

[Sean]

My main takeaway: definitely prefer spring and summer poems to fall and winter ones. I thought I was going to love the whole book, but I stopped dog-earing halfway through.

Having been guilty of putting another snow poem out into the world, I now see there's only so much you can say about it.

Standouts for me:
"Resurrections," A. R. Ammons
"I So Liked Spring," Charlotte Mew
"Naming of Parts," Henry Reed
"The House Was Quiet and the World Was Calm," Wallace Stevens
"End of May," Mona van Duyn
"I Think," James Schuyler
"Summer Night," Langston Hughes

[Giulia · Rating 4 out of 5]

Lovely to get into the mood for the seasons :)

[Sherry Collins · Rating 5 out of 5]

I started this book in spring and have been reading it seasonally. What beautiful words and vivid images poetry can place in your mind, if only I could paint!!!!

[Rachel · Rating 3 out of 5]

Good anthology, Interesting mix of poems.

[Lottie Liza · Rating 4 out of 5]

A truly wonderful collection of poems. Certain seasons had less range than others, but there were a lot of beautiful poems to be found.

[Marie Sveingard · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5*

[vivreadsbooks · Rating 2 out of 5]

It's a me thing, not a this collection thing. I thought I'd give poetry another go, but turns out it just reall isn't for me.

[Emily Taylor · Rating 4 out of 5]

A lovely collection I’ve dipped in and out of this year.

[Marda · Rating 4 out of 5]

I marked 11 poems in this collection as special/favorites. All of the autumn poems were rather sad and somber.

[bianca · Rating 4 out of 5]

i found this collection of poems at the perfect time, or maybe it found me. i find myself often revisiting it.

[Claire💌 · Rating 5 out of 5]

A beautiful companion of a read, especially as the seasons change…I particularly enjoyed the works by Emily Brontë and Emily Dickinson. 🍂🍁❄️

[a_tps_person · Rating 3 out of 5]

Spring: 55
Summer: 90, 116
Fall: 189
Winter: 223

[Fleur · Rating 4 out of 5]

A really nice, relatively versatile anthology for anyone who enjoys nature themed poetry. Much more fun to me than Poems of the Sea from this series.

[Kem White · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is another very good Everyman's Library Pocket Poets Volume. The book is divided into four sections, one for each season. The sections on Spring and Summer had my favorite poems even though I'm a big fan of Fall and Winter. Mary Oliver's "Summer Poem," Langston Hughes' "Summer Night," and Robert Frost's "Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening" are all beautiful and evocative. They were among my very favorites in this small volume. There were a number of poems I really disliked. Jean Garrigue's "The Flux of Autumn" was the worst. I didn't (couldn't?) finish. It was way too pompous and self-important for me. I still struggle to understand and like Emily Dickinson. There were several of her poems in the book but, for instance, "Further in Summer than the Birds" I found totally inscrutable and actively disliked. Finally, I read Ted Hughes' "Heatwave" many times every which way and it made no sense. Overall, this is a nice collection of poems on a topic familiar to us all. If you like poetry, this is an estimable volume to choose.

[Sam Sigelakis-Minski · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good selection, though the Fall section seems a little one-sided as far as emotional evocation. Also, based on some poem choices you can see the editor's literary friends are. This is not necessarily a bad thing, because the selection didn't lose anything by his choosing certain authors over others. Altogether an interesting collection.

[Timothy Deer · Rating 4 out of 5]

Even for non-poetry readers, this volume is quite enjoyable. It's the perfect thing to pull out during a snow storm, or a spring rain shower, or a hot summer afternoon, or a brisk autumnal morning. It helped me feel transported to the nucleus of what we associate with each season. It made me feel in touch with the present.