For more information about the National Book Award, click here.

2018     Indecency by Justin Phillip Reed
2017     Half-light : collected poems, 1965-2016 by Frank Bidart
2016     The performance of becoming human by Daniel Borzutzky
2015     Voyage of the Sable Venus : and other poems by Robin Coste Lewis
2014     Faithful and virtuous night by Louise Glück
2013     Incarnadine : poems by Mary Szybist
2012     Bewilderment : new poems and translations by David Ferry
2011     Head off & split : poems by Nikky Finney
2010     Lighthead by Terrance Hayes
2009     Transcendental studies : a trilogy by Keith Waldrop
2008     Fire to fire : new and selected poems by Mark Doty
2007     Time and materials : poems, 1997-2005 by Robert Hass
2006     Splay anthem by Nathaniel Mackey
2005     Migration : new and selected poems by W. S. Merwin
2004     Door in the mountain : new and collected poems, 1965-2003 by Jean Valentine
2003     The singing by C. K. Williams
2002     In the next galaxy by Ruth Stone
2001     Poems seven : new and complete poetry by Alan Dugan
2000     Blessing the boats : new and selected poems, 1988-2000 by Lucille Clifton
1999     Vice : new and selected poems by Ai
1998     This time:  new and selected poems by Gerald Stern
1997     Effort at speech : new and selected poems by William Meredith
1996     Scrambled eggs & whiskey : poems, 1991-1995 by Hayden Carruth
1995     Passing through : the later poems, new and selected by Stanley Kunitz
1994     Worshipful Company of Fletchers : poems by James Tate
1993     Garbage by A. R. Ammons
1992     New and selected poems by Mary Oliver
1991     What work is : poems by Philip Levine
1990     No Award
1989     No Award
1988     No Award
1987     No Award
1986     No Award
1985     No Award
1984     No Award
1983     Selected poems by Galway Kinnell; Country music : selected early poems by Charles Wright
1982     Life supports : new and collected poems by William Bronk
1981     The need to hold still : poems by Lisel Mueller
1980     Ashes : poems new & old by Philip Levine
1979     Mirabell, books of number by James Merrill
1978     The collected poems of Howard Nemerov by Howard Nemerov
1977     Collected poems, 1930-1976 : including 43 new poems by Richard Eberhart
1976     Self-portrait in a convex mirror : poems by John Ashbery
1975     Presentation piece by Marilyn Hacker
1974     The fall of America; poems of these States, 1965-1971 by Allen Ginsberg; Diving into the wreck : poems, 1971-1972 by Adrienne Rich
1973     Collected poems, 1951-1971 by A. R. Ammons
1972     Selected poems by Howard Moss; The collected poems of Frank O'Hara by Frank O'Hara
1971     To see, to take; poems by Mona Van Duyn
1970     The complete poems by Elizabeth Bishop
1969     His toy, his dream, his rest; 308 dream songs by John Berryman
1968     The light around the body; poems by Robert Bly
1967     Nights and days; poems by James Merrill
1966     Buckdancer's choice; poems by James Dickey
1965     The far field by Theodore Roethke
1964     Selected poems by John Crowe Ransom
1963     Traveling through the dark by William Stafford
1962     Poems by Alan Dugan
1961     The woman at the Washington Zoo; poems & translations by Randall Jarrell
1960     Life studies by Robert Lowell
1959     Words for the wind; the collected verse of Theodore Roethke by Theodore Roethke
1958     Promises; poems 1954-1956 by Robert Penn Warren
1957     Things of this world by Richard Wilbur
1956     The shield of Achilles by W. H. Auden
1955     Collected poems by Wallace Stevens
1954     Collected poems by Conrad Aiken (2nd ed. (1970) is here)
1953     Collected poems, 1917-1952 by Archibald MacLeish
1952     Collected poems by Marianne Moore
1951     The auroras of autumn by Wallace Stevens
1950     Paterson:  Book III and selected poems by William Carlos Williams