Dorianne Laux's fifth collection, The Book of Men, was awarded the Paterson Prize. Her fourth book of poems, Facts About the Moon, won the Oregon Book Award and was short-listed for the Lenore Marshall Poetry Prize. Laux is also the author of Awake; What We Carry, a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award; Smoke; as well as a fine small press edition, The Book of Women.

We're celebrating National Poetry Month at The Writer's Almanac. Thank you so much for taking the time to speak with us. Let's begin by asking about the poets and poems that have meant a lot to you in your own life. Do you remember the first poetry book you bought? Were there particular poets you read and, at some point, thought, "These are my people!"

I'm surprised that I can no longer remember the very first poetry book I bought. I remember many of the firsts: Philip Levine's One for the Rose, Thomas Lux's chapbook Tarantulas on the Lifebuoy, Carolyn Forche's The Country Between Us, Sharon Olds' Satan Says. They all came out in the early '80s. I'd read poetry books on my mother's bookshelf — E.E. Cummings, Carl Sandburg, Robert Frost, and in anthologies she had — and later borrowed books from teachers and friends, but these were among the first books I saved my money and bought for myself so I could have them with me always. I still own them all.

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