Craig Raine has an extraterrestrial sensibility. His 1979 volume, "A Martian Sends a Postcard Home," established a new school of poetry -- for those who experience this world as if it were Mars. Writing from the unfamiliar perspective of a space alien living in modern England, Raine forces his reader

Clever, Dense, Distorted, Illusive, Postmodern poetry, Quirky

As the Postmodern era moves on (or ends, no one is really sure), poetry suffers from an identity crisis. The identity narrative is over -- no one believes in a single, monolithic self thanks to the well spring of Poststructural theories. Nobody looks to poets as spiritual guides anymore -- they are a

Collage, Dissonant, Eclectic, Layered, Postmodern poetry, Sincere

Language in Harryette Mullen's poetry is like a loop of sound-bytes edited by an imp of the anti-establishment. Threads of African American vernacular meet Spanish idiom, only to emerge as speech from the mouth of a white Gen-Xer. The result is a constantly shifting notion of linguistic identity. Mu

Deconstructive, Postmodern poetry, Rhythmic, Slangy, Whimsical