The Best American Poetry 2006

The Best American Poetry 2006, a volume in The Best American Poetry series, was edited by David Lehman (general editor), and poet Billy Collins, guest editor.

The volume received some negative reviews. A review in the RATTLE by G. Tod Stone stated that "[w]hat establishment-order literati like Lehman and Collins are succeeding in doing, more than anything else, is keeping American poetry from being the best." 

On the other hand, and more positively, James Owens wrote in the Pedestal Review that "[r]eaders who care about poetry need The Best American Poetry 2006. Get it. Read it. Just don’t stop there." ; writing in the Beloit Poetry Journal, Marion K. Stocking, remarked that "If a selection of the poets in Collins’s collection went on the road with their poems they should be reading to packed houses."