June 16, 1947

Ellen Bass (June 16, 1947) is an American writer. I actually do not care for confessional poetry but Bass's is clear and graceful. Here are a few titles of poems from her book The Human Line (2012):

Sleeping in My Mother's Bed

The Moment I Knew I Shouldn't Have Married My Husband

The Woman Who Killed My Cat

Asking Directions in Paris.

Those are TITLES. Here is an excerpt from a poem of hers that Garrison Keillor used in his Writer's Almanac:


But for the ill,....
...
may you be spared from friends who say,
God doesn't give you more than you can handle.
....
May they just keep their mouths shut
and give you French chocolates and daffodils
and maybe a small, original Matisse,
......

These lines are from her poem "French Chocolates" from Like a Beggar (2014). And here is some more information about the biography of this American poet.