10 of the Best Maggie Smith Poems Everyone Should Read

The American poet Maggie Smith (born 1977) has become one of the most popular and most widely read contemporary poets, thanks to her poetry being shared on social media and elsewhere online. Her easy, conversational mode of address makes us feel as if we are being ushered into her confidence, but this colloquial style masks the artfulness of Smith’s verse, which is highly controlled and structured. Like the poetry of Mary Oliver, another poet whose work is affirmative and uplifting without shying away from the darker aspects of the modern world, Maggie Smith has been encountered and enjoyed by many readers who might otherwise not choose to pick up a poetry book. With that in mind, what are Maggie Smith’s best poems, beyond those which have ‘gone viral’ online in recent years? Below, we select and introduce ten of our favourites. 1. ‘ How Dark the Beginning ’. In this 2020 poem, Smith notes how ‘light’ is synonymous with ‘goodness’ in the popular imagination and in film (indeed, poetry too, we might add). Instead, she wants to focus on the ‘good dark’ that accompanies the true beginning of the day, before sunrise, when dawn first breaks. ‘Let there be light’? If the darkest hour really is before the dawn, then that dark may not necessarily be something to fear – nor should the light be something we inherently trust. 2. ‘ First Fall ’. The title of this 2017 poem refers to Smith’s experience showing her young child their first autumn. It’s another Maggie Smith poem that takes place at early dawn: that time when the stars are still out (just about) as the sun begins to rise over the horizon. She points out the sycamores, telling her child the name by which the trees go by, and invites her young child to attend to the crisp sounds of the leaves. Smith is aware that this is also her child’s first experience of things dying, unaware that they will grow back the following year. 3. ‘ Parachute ’. Beautiful things, Smith asserts in this touching poem, remind us of […]

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