From the two-term
Poet Laureate of the United States Billy Collins comes his first
volume of new and selected poems in twelve years. Aimless Love
combines fifty new poems with generous selections from his four most
recent books—Nine Horses, The Trouble with Poetry, Ballistics, and
Horoscopes for the Dead. Collins’s unmistakable voice, which brings
together plain speech with imaginative surprise, is clearly heard on
every page, reminding us how he has managed to enrich the tapestry of
contemporary poetry and greatly expand its audience. His work is
featured in top literary magazines such as The New Yorker, Poetry,
and The Atlantic, and he sells out reading venues all across the
country. Appearing regularly in The Best American Poetry series, his
poems appeal to readers and live audiences far and wide and have been
translated into more than a dozen languages. By turns playful,
ironic, and serious, Collins’s poetry captures the nuances of
everyday life while leading the reader into zones of inspired wonder.
In the poet’s own words, he hopes that his poems “begin in Kansas
and end in Oz.” Touching on the themes of love, loss, joy, and
poetry itself, these poems showcase the best work of this “poet of
plenitude, irony, and Augustan grace” (The New Yorker).