Benjamin Zephaniah’s urgent, imperative “To Michael Menson” was written when he was a poet in residence at a human rights barrister in England. His poem resonates with his repeated calls for justice for a murdered Black musician — not a justice that is gullible, impotent, or hopeless but one that is clear-eyed, collaborative, and mighty.
Yesterday
Orlando Ricardo Menes — Grace
Some religions and some people have very specific ideas about “grace”, and that includes poet Orlando Ricardo Menes. In the carefully constructed “Grace”, he manages to both demystify and remystify what grace is, leaving us with the possibility that at any moment or no moment it ... Show More
15m 20s
Jan 16
W.S. Merwin — For The Anniversary of My Death
W.S. Merwin’s “For The Anniversary of My Death” is a slim, precise poem — just 13 lines made up of 84 words — about the very weightiest of subjects, one’s future death. With it, Merwin has crafted an elegant vessel, a small and sturdy container to hold some of life’s big question ... Show More
15m 17s
Aug 2024
1180: The Gardener 85 by Rabindranath Tagore
<p>Today’s poem is The Gardener 85 by Rabindranath Tagore.</p><br/><p>The Slowdown is your daily poetry ritual. In this episode, Major writes… “Poetry has a way of collapsing time, and by working the senses, having us experience an era. In the blues rhythms of Langston Hughes’ po ... Show More
6m 17s
Nov 2024
Craig Arnold's "Meditation on a Grapefruit"
<p>Craig Arnold, born November 16, 1967 was an American poet and professor. His first book of poems, <em>Shells</em> (1999), was selected by W.S. Merwin for the Yale Series of Younger Poets. His many honors include the 2005 Joseph Brodsky Rome Prize Fellowship in literature, the ... Show More
9m 13s
Oct 2014
Becca J.R. Lachman, “A Ritual to Read Together: Poems in Conversation with William Stafford” (Woodley Press, 2013)
About twenty years ago, I heard William Stafford read his poetry for about twenty minutes. For a young aspiring writer like I was then, he was mesmerizing, a mix of poetic energy and grandfatherly wisdom, with a high-spirited charm. I think it was the first poetry reading that I ... Show More
37m 36s
Mar 2025
George the Poet on Music, Memory, and the War on Blackness (Part One)
George Mpanga, known as George the Poet, is seen by many as one of the UK’s most compelling voices in poetry, music, and social commentary.
Originally hailing from St Raphael’s Estate in Neasden, Mpanga has spent over a decade working at the intersection of art and politics ref ... Show More
26m 24s
Feb 2025
Alcools, by Guillaume Apollinaire. Partie III.
Apollinaire is a pivotal figure in the history of French poetry. Friend of Picasso, albeit a sometimes volatile one, inventor of the term 'surrealism' and the poem without punctuation, he advocated a poetry that was direct and intuitive, free of any refined intellectualis ... Show More
46m 57s
<p><strong>John Keats</strong> (31 October 1795 – 23 February 1821) was an English poet prominent in the second generation of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Romanticism" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Romantic</a> poets, with <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/w ... Show More
<strong>Robert Frost, </strong>born March 26, 1874, <a href="https://www.britannica.com/place/San-Francisco-California" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">San Francisco</a>, <a href="https://www.britannica.com/place/California-state" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blan ... Show More
