Poetry Unbound in Conversation — Martín Espada
“Politics by themselves are necessary but not sufficient … [and] poetry by itself is necessary but not sufficient. We must find a way to bri...
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Poetry Unbound
Your poetry ritual: An immersive reading of a single poem, guided by Pádraig Ó Tuama. Unhurried, contemplative and energizing. New episodes on Monday and Friday, about 15 minutes each. Two s...
Episodes
20 of 229 episodesPoetry Unbound in Conversation — Amanda Quaid
After actor, dialect coach, and teacher Amanda Quaid was diagnosed with a serious illness in 2021, she responded by trying something new — s...
Poetry Unbound in Conversation — Haleh Liza Gafori
Poet, translator, and musician Haleh Liza Gafori describes the revered 13th-century Persian poet Rumi as “a good pal to humanity”. As she pu...
Poetry Unbound in Conversation — Adrian Matejka
“For me, if a poem doesn't swing, it's really not much of a poem,” says Adrian Matejka, author of the collection Be Easy: New and Selected P...
Poetry Unbound in Conversation — Karen Leeder
After listening to this exuberant interview, you’ll retire the phrase “lost in translation” from your vocabulary. Instead, writer and schola...
Poetry Unbound in Conversation — Richard Scott
“Poetry means paying attention in a different way to the world and seeing what wisdom you're given back in return for that attention,” says...
Poetry Unbound in Conversation — Kimberly Campanello part 2 of 2
“It had to involve more than just a slim volume of verse,” says Kimberly Campanello about MOTHERBABYHOME, her ongoing visual poetry project...
Poetry Unbound in Conversation — Kimberly Campanello part 1 of 2
“It's about seeing, through reading, whether where you are going has been or is now or will be written, or not.” This deliciously twisty lin...
Poetry Unbound in Conversation — Rachel Mann and Yomi Ṣode
“Poetry should be horrifying,” says Rachel Mann. “It should be … on the edge of the edge of what could be said.” We are delighted to bring y...
Poetry Unbound in Conversation — Fady Joudah
From a young age, says Palestinian American poet and physician Fady Joudah, “I had such a fascination with the way the alphabet makes music...
Poetry Unbound in Conversation — Don McKay
“I still have the best three-point shot of any Canadian poet born before 1943” is one of the first things that acclaimed poet Don McKay says...
Poetry Unbound Bonus — Walter de la Mare
Host Pádraig Ó Tuama shares “The Listeners” by Walter de la Mare, a favorite childhood poem of his, and offers an audio postscript to Season...
Leonard Cohen — Book of Mercy “I,8”
Have you ever watched, in awe, as a skilled gymnast or skater lifts off and completes a dizzying number of revolutions in less than a second...
Billy-Ray Belcourt — Subarctica
Will you leave this episode feeling uplifted, envious, curious, or something else entirely? Yes. Billy-Ray Belcourt’s poem “Subarctica” tran...
Ruth Irupé Sanabria — Carne
Ruth Irupé Sanabria’s delicious and dexterous “ Carne ” begins with these lines: “I've eaten pork from / pernil to chuletas to chitterlings....
Lena Khalaf Tuffaha — Dukka
Loving in the face of violence, danger, and distress is an act of defiance, as demonstrated in Lena Khalaf Tuffaha’s achingly beautiful poem...
Rachel Mann — #TDOR
Rachel Mann’s “#TDOR” manages to turn a depiction of one side of a conversation about marking Trans Day of Remembrance into a poem that is b...
Sanah Ahsan — Ramadan’s Greeting
Sanah Ahsan’s evocative “Ramadan’s Greeting” brings us into the thoughts and experiences of a person observing the holiest month in Islam. I...
Kevin Hart — Prayer
“O come, in any way you want” is the first line in Kevin Hart’s marvelous, mystical “Prayer”. So come to this poem — whether for its delicio...
Harryette Mullen — LUVTOFU
Too many of us left high school thinking that a poem could be taken seriously only if it was difficult to understand, subdued in its use of...