Taking as its point of departure the idea that literary theory is more than ever needed to question the ways in which literature connects transitively with the knowledge produced in the social sciences, and affords the possibility of making more intense and more intricate our repertories for engaging, understanding, and shaping experience in the world, this course will explore recent trends in American poetry and their links with found language, documentary structures, the confessional, and computational media. As we engage with these new ecosystems and practices through the practice of close reading, we will move toward an appreciation for the contemporary conversation about poetry (poetics) in the making.