The National Book Critics Circle has announced finalists for the 2012 National Book Critics Circle Award in Poetry. Two of the nominees, Yusef Komunyakaa (The Chameleon Couch) and Bruce Smith (Devotions), were nominated for the National Book Award last fall; the award was eventually won by Nikky Finney. Here are all five nominees:

Forrest Gander, Core Samples from the World (New Directions)

Aracelis Girmay, Kingdom Animalia (BOA Editions)

Laura Kasischke, Space, in Chains (Copper Canyon Press)

Yusef Komunyakaa, The Chameleon Couch (Farrar, Straus, and Giroux)

Bruce Smith, Devotions (University of Chicago Press)

The National Book Critics Circle, founded in 1974, “is a nonprofit organization of book reviewers and critics that honors outstanding writing and fosters a national conversation about reading, criticism, and literature, in part through annual awards for the year’s outstanding books. Books are directly nominated and chosen by leading book critics. The NBCC thus offers the unique opportunity for professional critics to recognize and reward literary excellence.”

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