A nationally recognized poet read excerpts of his award-winning book to a full classroom Tuesday night in Reed Hall.Nathaniel Mackey, whose poetry collection “Splay Anthem” won him the 2006 National Book Award for Poetry, read his work in front of about 65 students and faculty members.

The poet, a professor at the University of California at Santa Cruz, said the poems he read reflect the recursiveness and echo that are part of “Splay Anthem.”

According to an editorial review from Publisher’s Weekly, the collection is both an extension and a fusion of the poet’s epics “Song of Andoumboulou” and “Mu,” which have been printed in installments over the last few decades.

The two epics, Mackey said, were inspired by pieces of music – one from the funeral music of a tribe in Mali, Africa, and one from the albums of trumpeter Don Cherry.

“Splay Anthem,” however, isn’t the poet’s only source of notoriety in the literature realm.

Mackey, born in 1947 in Miami, has published numerous other poetry collections including “Eroding Witness,” which was chosen for publication in the National Poetry Series. Mackey is also editor of the literary journal “Hambone,” and he is a Chancellor of the Academy of American Poets.

In his introduction of the poet, English department chair Dan Williams said Mackey’s work challenges his audience to stray from life’s accepted order.

“His work mixes things that define and redefine boundary lines,” Williams said. “… The poetry demonstrates the politics of living as well as the politics of art.”

Students who attended the reading said they were no less impressed with Mackey’s poetry than Williams.

“I was expecting it to be really boring, but I was strangely interested once I got there,” junior English major Reggie Nash said. “I think it was something to think about. It wasn’t like ‘rhyme-y’ or like the standard stuff we read in class. It was more peculiar so it made me interested.”

Tiffany Sullivan, a junior English major, agreed.

“He is a very modern poet,” she said. “It’s very unique listening to him. The style that he read in was a lot different. Usually poets will try to be very loud and dramatic and he was very calm … He read it as if he were playing jazz.