The Maximus Poems
Olson's massive "projective verse" epic, centered on the fishing port of Gloucester, Massachusetts: a meditation on place, history, and the phenomenology of attention. Less accessible than most books on this list, but foundational to the Black Mountain School, the Language Poets, and the entire tradition of postwar American experimental poetry. His essay "Projective Verse" was the most influential single document in American experimental poetics.
Olson's lines demand the Gloucester town records, Hesiod, and a companion volume just to parse the references, and the late sections thin into private jottings even devotees pick through. The theory (projective verse, breath as measure) is clearer in his essay than on these scattered pages. Influence this large rarely coexists with so few people finishing the actual poem.
The case for it and the rest of the canon open with Pro.
