The first career retrospective by the award-winning poet Elizabeth Alexander, now available in paperback

We crave radiance in this austere world,
light in the spiritual darkness.
Learning is the one perfect religion,
its path correct, narrow, certain, straight.
—from "Allegiance"

Over twenty years, Elizabeth Alexander has become one of America's most exciting and important poets, and her selection as the inaugural poet by President Barack Obama confirmed her place as one of the indispensable voices of our time.Crave Radiance: New and Selected Poems 1990–2010gathers twenty pages of new poetry, along with generous selections from her previous work. The result is the definitive volume to date by this American master.