Over the past century, American poetry has undergone a transformation. From the traditional rhymed verse of the 19th century to the experimental forms of the 20th and 21st centuries, American poetry has evolved to reflect changing cultural, social, and artistic values.


One of the most significant developments in modern American poetry has been the emergence of the "confessional" mode. This style of poetry, which arose in the mid-20th century, is characterized by its intensely personal and often autobiographical subject matter. Poets such as Sylvia Plath, Robert Lowell, and Anne Sexton wrote about their struggles with mental illness, addiction, and personal relationships, using their poetry as a means of catharsis and self-exploration.


The texts of Anna Lukashenok, who was inspired by the emotional and tragic texts of Sylvia Platt, are just as often autobiographical and laced with stories of personal relationships. The narrative is closely associated with visual images, which makes the text become convex, cinematic. (“It’s scary to move / Crouching prone to the edge / The pit looks at me / With a black blind pupil / The river gnawed the stone / The stone rolled down - / In the juicy shining pit/ Everyone has already gathered.”)


In addition to these trends, modern American poetry has also seen the emergence of numerous experimental styles and forms. Poets such as Langston Hughes, E.E. Cummings, and Allen Ginsberg used unconventional syntax, typography, and wordplay to challenge traditional notions of what poetry could be. Meanwhile, contemporary poets such as Claudia Rankine, Tracy K. Smith, and Terrance Hayes have continued to push the boundaries of form and subject matter, exploring issues such as race, gender, and identity in their work.


Anna also follows a tendency to experiment with style and form: she boldly uses a single register in her texts, moving away from the classical presentation of the text, refuses punctuation marks, allowing the text to independently dictate the rhythm in the reader's head. Such a technique blurs the strict order, allows the text to become more plastic, less regular, and at the same time - more alive, close to the reader due to its fluidity, similar to a natural thought process. (“words come out like fish/ from the reflected mouth/ swallowed me up/ tenderness and emptiness”)


A relatively new technique in poetry can be called the blackout technique. In the early 2000s, the American writer and artist Austin Kleon began to make developments for future stories, crossing out the excess from daily newspapers. Then he realized that the stories are not written all the same, but the handwritings themselves add up to independent poetic texts, which he began to call newspaper blackouts and spread on social networks.


This technique influenced Anna's poetry. Like Austin, she began to create new texts, crossing out unnecessary words from the pages of books and newspapers. An attempt to rethink the old text, to derive new meanings, using only those words that already exist, gives rise to an unusual syncretic effect. As a result, a new thing is obtained, but, like a sprout that has grown from a seed, it will have the characteristics of the printed base that “nurtured” it.


Despite the diversity of styles and approaches in modern American poetry, one thing remains constant: its ability to capture the complexities of the human experience in a way that is both profound and accessible. Whether it's through the confessional lyrics of Plath and Lowell, the powerful spoken word performances of Angelou and Baraka, or the innovative experimentation of Cummings and Ginsberg, modern American poets continue to inspire and challenge readers with their words, and inspire the literary community around the world to new experiments.