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Amy Newman is the author of four poetry collections, including Dear Editor (2011), winner of the Lexi Rudnitsky Editor’s Choice Award. She is the Presidential Research Professor in the department of English at Northern Illinois University. Newman was a finalist in Narrative’s First Annual Poetry Contest. She lives in DeKalb, Illinois.



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An Incomplete Encyclopedia
of Happiness
and Unhappiness

by Amy Newman
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An incomplete encyclopedia of happiness
would have an entry on you
and a map of the walk you took when you were ten,
jingling your allowance and imagining a kingdom.
It would have a list of places to go for ice cream
and a compendium of the naturally sweet fruits,
their hues of flesh arranged on a color chart,
and types of candies in alphabetical order.

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Reader Comments

  • The poem's correlation between an intangible idea like happiness and the...
  • What a recognition of the joy and pain we all can...
  • This poem is almost unbelievable in its many achievements and varying...
  • "An Incomplete Encyclopedia . . ." is of those poems one...
  • Newman's poem moved me. It was finely felt. Thank you, Amy,...

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