A single polarization fiber and/or amplifier includes a non-polarization preserving fiber 10 having a fiber grating tap 12 which has a predetermined length and strength (.DELTA.n/n) and is oriented at a predetermined angle .theta. and has a grating spacing D so as to couple-out of the fiber 10 a predetermined amount of one polarization 24 over a predetermined wavelength range of an input light 16 and pass the other polarization 28 as output light 26, the grating length being substantially the length of the fiber 10. Alternatively, all or a portion of the fiber 10 may be doped to form a polarization sensitive optical amplifier.