A collection of playfully elucidating essays to help reluctant poetry readers become well-versed in verse. Developed from Adam Sols popular blog, How a Poem Moves is a collection of 35 short essays that walks readers through an array of contemporary poems spanning traditions, techniques, and ambitions.

How a poem puts skin on a mystery : "Making light of it" / Philip Levine --How a poem shapes memory : "Stealing lilacs in the cemetery" / Deborah Digges -- How a poem articulates a feeling : "Love: beginnings" / C.K. Williams -- How a poem crystallizes an image : "Yellowjackets" / Yusef Komunyakaa -- How a poem makes meaning with music : "Domestic interior: child watching mother" / Elise Partridge -- How a poem snapshots a moment of drama : "My brother comes to me" / Tiphanie Yanique -- How a poem seduces us with outlandishness : "Free beer" / Diane Seuss -- How a poem cooks up dark insight : "Recipe from the Abbasid" / Philip Metres -- How a poem pushes us away and beckons us closer : "How to make pemmican" / Marilyn Dumont -- How a poem wrestles with its inheritance : "Ghazal: in the Persian" / Rahat Kurd -- How a poem lives between languages : "Flower that drops its petals" / Natalia Toledo, trans. Clare Sullivan -- How a poem invites us to praise : "Ode to drinking water from my hands" / Ross Gay -- How a poem answers some questions but not others : "The light I've seen in your hair I have found in my own hands" / Amber McMillan -- How a poem clarifies its blur : "Aubade Photoshop" / Jeff Latosik -- How a poem changes as we read : "Shattered" / Ali Blythe -- How a poem will (not) save us : "Life with tigers" / Raoul Fernandes -- How a poem loves a misunderstanding : "Dots everywhere" / Richard Siken -- How a poem mistrusts its idols : "You be the skipper, I'll be the sea" / Cassidy McFadzean -- How a poem doesn't dish : "Ode to a rolling blackout" / Damian Rogers -- How a poem impersonates a tomato : "Queer facts about vegetables" / Oliver Bendorf -- How a poem seeks new models : "[The most visible ants are]" / Shannon Maguire -- How a poem makes itself out of unusual materials : "Especially in a time" / Madhur Anand -- How a poem chooses the apocalypse behind curtain #3 : "The new Let's make a deal" / Jennifer L. Know -- How a poem assembles a smashed record for posterity : From "#DaydreamBereaver" / George Murray -- How a poem tries to connect us, despite the obstacles : "Model city [4]" / Donna Stonecipher -- How a poem welcomes us to the neighbourhood : "[Night of nesting dolls]" / Bren Simmers -- How a poem evokes wonder : "Botany" / Sarah Holland-Batt -- How a poem reaches for transcendence : "Ash" / Eric Pankey -- How a poem mourns / "Mercies" / Don Paterson -- How a poem confronts the limitations of our empathy : "Trials" / Soraya Peerbaye -- How a poem tries to get into it : "Little Song" / Rowan Ricardo Phillips -- How a poem chattily wonders about life's purpose : "On H.C. Andersen Boulevard during rush hour" / Ulrikka S. Gernes -- How a poem transforms a stroll into a ceremony : "Walk" / Joy Harjo -- How a poem imperfectly reconciles complexity : "A wake" / Liz Howard -- How a poem haunts : "Lines for little Mila" / Norman Dubie.