A social worker holds a group for teenagers at a school. They only half pay attention to him. Then something happens, and they pay attention to each other. Benjamin Gucciardi was born and raised in San Francisco, California. His first book, West Portal (University of Utah Press, 2021), was selected by Gabrielle Calvocoressi for the Agha Shahid Ali Prize in Poetry and was named a finalist for the Northern California Book Award and the Julie Suk Award. He is also the author of the chapbooks Timele...
Jun 05, 2023•15 min•Ep 5•Transcript available on Metacast Have you ever had a private moment — perhaps in the middle of the night — in a large city? When it just seems like it’s you and the great dreaming metropolis? Rowan Ricardo Phillips brings us into a memory he can’t forget, complete with a Wu-Tang Clan soundtrack. Rowan Ricardo Phillips is a highly acclaimed, multi-award-winning poet, author, screenwriter, academic, journalist, and translator. His poetry collections include The Ground (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2012), Heaven (2015), Living Weapo...
Jun 02, 2023•13 min•Ep 4•Transcript available on Metacast In a poem of strict rhymes and old forms, Alexander Posey (1873-1908), a poet of the Creek Nation, poses challenges to pomposity. Alexander Posey was a poet, editor, and satirist born in 1873 in the Creek Nation. Posey was the publisher of the first Indian-published daily newspaper, the Eufaula Indian Journal . Find the transcript for this show at onbeing.org. We’re pleased to offer Alexander Posey’s poem , and invite you to connect with Poetry Unbound throughout this season....
May 29, 2023•12 min•Ep 3•Transcript available on Metacast In a church there are liturgies and prayers and statues. But in José Olivarez’s poem, there are more urgent things taking place, things that have “no time to wait.” José Olivarez is the son of Mexican immigrants. He is the author of Promises of Gold , a collection of poems. His debut book of poems, Citizen Illegal , was a finalist for the PEN/Jean Stein Award and a winner of the 2018 Chicago Review of Books Poetry Prize. It was named a top book of 2018 by The Adroit Journal , NPR, and the New Yo...
May 26, 2023•11 min•Ep 2•Transcript available on Metacast Friendships deserve praise songs, and here’s a praise song — an ode — to friends that have crossed continents for each other, and would go further if needed. Sudanese by way of D.C., Safia Elhillo is the author of Girls That Never Die , The January Children , and Home Is Not a Country , and is co-editor of the anthology Halal If You Hear Me . Winner of the Sillerman First Book Prize for African Poets, the Arab American Book Award, and the Brunel International African Poetry Prize, she is also th...
May 22, 2023•12 min•Ep 1•Transcript available on Metacast Poetry Unbound with host Pádraig Ó Tuama is back on Monday, May 22. Featured poets in this season include Selina Nwulu, Wo Chan, Rowan Ricardo Phillips, Mark Turcotte, and many more. New episodes released every Monday and Friday through July 28. Follow us on Apple Podcasts , Spotify , Google Podcasts , Overcast , or wherever you listen....
May 15, 2023•2 min•Transcript available on Metacast Friends, we are awakening your Poetry Unbound feed for a moment to share this episode from the big, beautiful new season of On Being . And Pádraig’s here with a quick hello and a glimpse of what more On Being conversations await you in coming months. You won’t want to miss — subscribe now in the On Being feed and catch each episode as it drops, every Thursday. And now… An electric conversation with Ada Limón's wisdom and her poetry — a refreshing, full-body experience of how this way with words ...
Feb 20, 2023•1 hr 13 min•Ep 25•Transcript available on Metacast As part of a celebratory launch party for the new Poetry Unbound book, Pádraig welcomed Lorna Goodison, former Poet Laureate of Jamaica, into a joyful Zoom room of poetry lovers and listeners of the show, old and new. We draw Season 6 to a close with their conversation on themes explored in Lorna’s poem “Reporting Back to Queen Isabella” (one of the 50 featured in the book): poetry as a “made thing”; poetry as a form of travel. And: Pádraig chats with our wonderful producer and composer Gautam S...
Dec 22, 2022•28 min•Transcript available on Metacast A younger woman looks at an older woman, admiring her beauty, skill, and freedom. Older now, she thinks of how hard-won such freedom is. Also: singing opera while taking off your clothes. That too. Danusha Laméris is a poet, teacher, and essayist. She is the author of The Moons of August (Autumn House, 2014), which was chosen by Naomi Shihab Nye as the winner of the Autumn House Press poetry prize, and was a finalist for the Milt Kessler Book Award. Her second book, Bonfire Opera (University of ...
Dec 16, 2022•15 min•Ep 24•Transcript available on Metacast Who brings you to praise? Rumi’s great poem of praise to the “you” is to his great friend Shams, and through that friendship, to God. Rumi was a 13th-century Muslim mystic and poet. He left behind a vast body of lyric poetry, metaphysical writings, lectures, and letters, which have influenced Persian, Urdu, and Turkish literature across the centuries. Haleh Liza Gafori is a translator, vocalist, poet, and educator of Persian descent born in New York City. She has sung and translated the poetry o...
Dec 12, 2022•15 min•Ep 23•Transcript available on Metacast What’s it like to be owned by the world, to have populations claiming you, to have millions speaking on your behalf? Naomi Shihab Nye takes a close look — from a distance — at Jesus, and herself. Naomi Shihab Nye is a professor of creative writing at Texas State University. From 2019-2021, Nye was the Young People's Poet Laureate through the Poetry Foundation. She is the author of You & Yours (BOA Editions 2005). Her more recent books include The Tiny Journalist (BOA Editions 2019), Voices in th...
Dec 09, 2022•15 min•Ep 22•Transcript available on Metacast Quiet. Shhh. Softly. Don’t make a fuss. Don’t upset the authorities. Victoria Adukwei Bulley unquiets the quiet. Victoria Adukwei Bulley is a poet, writer, and artist. She is the author of Quiet (Faber Books 2022; Knopf 2023), which was shortlisted for the 2022 T.S. Eliot Prize. Bulley is currently a doctoral student at the Royal Holloway, University of London. Find the transcript for this show at onbeing.org. We’re pleased to offer Victoria Adukwei Bulley’s poem, and invite you to connect with ...
Dec 05, 2022•15 min•Ep 21•Transcript available on Metacast On the day you wake to a broken window in your car, what do you do? And what happens when the woman repairing that window offers a glimpse of something new? Benjamín Naka-Hasebe Kingsley belongs to the Onondaga Nation of Indigenous Americans in New York. He is the author of Dēmos (Milkweed 2021), Colonize Me (Saturnalia 2019) , and Not Your Mama’s Melting Pot (University of Nebraska Press 2018) . Naka-Hasebe Kingsley is an assistant professor of English at Kalamazoo College. Find the transcript ...
Dec 02, 2022•18 min•Ep 20•Transcript available on Metacast When you move to a new place, everything seems different. Hell’s not hot anymore; it’s freezing. A poem of strangeness and wonder. Dan Vera is a writer, editor, watercolorist, and literary historian. Vera is the author of two books of poetry: Speaking Wiri Wiri (Red Hen Press 2013) and The Space Between Our Danger and Delight (Beothuk Books 2008). His honors include the Oscar Wilde Award for Poetry (2017) and the Letras Latinas/Red Hen Poetry Prize (2012). Find the transcript for this show at on...
Nov 28, 2022•13 min•Ep 19•Transcript available on Metacast Who decides what’s self care and what isn’t? Who benefits? Who pays? Upon whom does the burden of self care rest? Solmaz Sharif excavates. Solmaz Sharif is the author of Customs (Graywolf Press 2022) and Look (Graywolf Press 2016), and was a finalist for the National Book Award. She holds degrees from UC Berkeley, where she studied and taught with June Jordan’s Poetry for the People, and New York University. Her work has appeared in Harper’s, The Paris Review, Poetry, The Kenyon Review , the New...
Nov 25, 2022•14 min•Ep 18•Transcript available on Metacast Some friendships are built on small encounters and last a lifetime. Two women — from across culture, location, and age — spend a lifetime in communication. Dunya Mikhail is an Iraqi-American poet and writer. She is the author of Diary of a Wave Outside the Sea (New Directions Publishing Corporation 2009), The Iraqi Nights (New Directions Publishing Corporation 2014), The Beekeeper (New Directions Publishing Corporation 2018), In Her Feminine Sign (New Directions Publishing Corporation 2019), and...
Nov 21, 2022•15 min•Ep 17•Transcript available on Metacast At the hingepoint of change, a poet walks through the garden his late father planted. Aaron Caycedo-Kimura is a writer and visual artist. He is the author of two poetry collections: Ubasute (Slapering Hol Press 2021), which won the 2020 Slapering Hol Press Chapbook Competition, and the full-length collection Common Grace (Beacon Press 2022). His honors include a Robert Pinsky Global Fellowship in Poetry, a St. Botolph Club Foundation Emerging Artist Award in Literature, and nominations for the P...
Nov 18, 2022•14 min•Ep 16•Transcript available on Metacast Firefighting pushes the body to breaking point; Kevin Goodan’s poem locates the “ash-dark art” of firefighting not just in the wilderness where the team worked, but in the muscles of the firefighters. Kevin Goodan was born in Montana and raised on the Flathead Indian Reservation where his stepfather and brothers are tribal members. Goodan earned his BA from the University of Montana and worked as a firefighter for ten years with the U.S. Forest Service before receiving his MFA from University of...
Nov 14, 2022•14 min•Ep 15•Transcript available on Metacast Sometimes leaving feels like you’re splitting yourself in two, but you leave anyway. What compels us? What holds us together even as we look back? David Whyte’s poem combines pain and promise as someone is both departing and venturing at the same time. David Whyte is the author of many books of poetry and prose. He grew up with a strong, imaginative influence from his Irish mother among the hills and valleys of his father’s Yorkshire. He now makes his home in the Pacific Northwest of the United ...
Nov 11, 2022•15 min•Ep 14•Transcript available on Metacast What is the landscape that has most influenced you? When do you go there? In person? Andrés N. Ordorica goes in dreams. Andrés N. Ordorica is a queer Latinx writer based in Edinburgh. His writing attempts to map the journey of his diasporic experience and unpack what it means to be from ni de aquí, ni de allá. His writing has been published widely and he regularly features at festivals around the UK. He is the recipient of a Second Life grant through the Edwin Morgan Trust. In 2021, his fiction ...
Nov 07, 2022•14 min•Ep 13•Transcript available on Metacast If you were to use a metaphor for your worries, what metaphor would you turn to? Here, the worries have worry babies of their own. And they look back at the poet. What do they see? Laura Villareal is the author of Girl’s Guide to Leaving (University of Wisconsin Press 2022), The Cartography of Sleep (Nostrovia! Press 2018), and Poems to Carry in Your Pocket (L'Éphémère Review 2018). Villareal interviews writers for the series “Writers Talking about Anything But Writing” at F(r)iction . Find the ...
Nov 04, 2022•13 min•Ep 12•Transcript available on Metacast The search for authentic love is a powerful hunger in humans and, as Stephanie Burt shares, in werewolves. Stephanie Burt is a poet, literary critic, and professor with nine published books, including two critical books on poetry and three poetry collections. Her essay collection Close Calls with Nonsense was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award. Her other works include We Are Mermaids ; Advice from the Lights ; The Poem Is You: 60 Contemporary American Poems and How to Read The...
Oct 31, 2022•13 min•Ep 11•Transcript available on Metacast Do you experience disgust at the sight of certain insects? Which ones? Fiona Benson teaches us how to see. Fiona Benson is the author of several poetry collections including Bright Travellers (Jonathan Cape 2014), Vertigo & Ghost (Jonathan Cape 2019), and Ephemeron (Jonathan Cape 2022). She is the winner of the 2015 Geoffrey Faber Memorial Prize for Bright Travellers and the Forward Prize for Vertigo & Ghost . In 2019, Fiona collaborated with sound artists Mair Bosworth and Eliza Lomas for an 18...
Oct 28, 2022•16 min•Ep 10•Transcript available on Metacast A man whose baby daughter has died turns to stars, mythology, and imagination for solace. There, he encounters what might help, a little. Saddiq Dzukogi is a poet and professor of English at Mississippi State University. He is the author of Your Crib, My Qibla (University of Nebraska Press, 2021), and winner of the 2021 Derek Walcott Prize for Poetry. Dzukogi is completing a PhD in English at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Find the transcript for this show at onbeing.org. We’re pleased to o...
Oct 24, 2022•15 min•Ep 9•Transcript available on Metacast What do you do when what sustains you no longer sustains you? A poet tries everything he can to reconnect with his art. Adam Zagajewski was a Polish poet and novelist born at the end of World War II. English translations of his books of poetry include Mysticism for Beginners (Farrar, Straus and Giroux 1999), Without End (Farrar, Straus and Giroux 2003), Eternal Enemies (Farrar, Straus and Giroux 2009), and Asymmetry (Farrar, Straus and Giroux 2019). Zagajewski was the recipient of a Guggenheim F...
Oct 21, 2022•13 min•Ep 8•Transcript available on Metacast The sounds of a city can be overwhelming — but in the imagination of this poem, they are made into something new. Carolina Ebeid is a multimedia poet. Her first book, You Ask Me to Talk About the Interior , was published by Noemi Press as part of the Akrilica Series, and selected as one of ten best debuts of 2016 by Poets & Writers. Her work has been supported by the Stadler Center for Poetry at Bucknell University, Bread Loaf, CantoMundo, as well as a residency fellowship from the Lannan Founda...
Oct 17, 2022•15 min•Ep 7•Transcript available on Metacast Asking for help is a thing of bravery. A poet describes her journey towards that help. Molly Twomey is a poet and editor from Lismore, County Waterford in Ireland. Twomey graduated in 2019 with a Masters in Creative Writing from University College Cork. Her work has been featured in Poetry Review, Poetry Ireland Review, Banshee, The Irish Times, Mslexia, and The Stinging Fly, among other publications . Twomey is the host of the monthly poetry discussion “Just to Say,” sponsored by Jacar Press. H...
Oct 14, 2022•15 min•Ep 6•Transcript available on Metacast In the aftermath of disaster, how do you sing a song to mark what’s gone, and praise what’s growing? Hinemoana Baker is a writer and musician living in Berlin, Germany. Baker descends from the Ngāi Tahu tribe in the South Island of New Zealand and from Ngāti Raukawa, Ngāti Toa, and Te Āti Awa in the North Island. Baker is the author of several books of poetry including mātuhi | needle (Victoria University Press and Percival Press 2004), kōiwi kōiwi | bone bone (Victoria University Press 2010), a...
Oct 10, 2022•14 min•Ep 5•Transcript available on Metacast What’s a moment when you grew up? When you realized the help you get might not be the help you want? Jennifer Huang is the author of Return Flight , which was awarded the 2021 Ballard Spahr Prize for Poetry from Milkweed Editions. Their poems have appeared in POETRY , The Rumpus , and Narrative Magazine , among other places. They have received recognition from the Academy of American Poets, Brooklyn Poets, and the North American Taiwan Studies Association. In 2020, Jennifer earned their MFA in P...
Oct 07, 2022•15 min•Ep 4•Transcript available on Metacast After her father’s death, a poet considers her relationship with loss. Gabeba Baderoon is an Associate Professor of Women’s Studies, Gender and Sexuality Studies, and African Studies at Penn State University and is the co-founder of the African Feminist Initiative at the university. She is the author of several collections of poetry, including The Dream in the Next Body (Kwela Books 2005), A hundred silences (Kwela Books 2006), and most recently, The History of Intimacy (Kwela Books 2018). Find ...
Oct 03, 2022•12 min•Ep 3•Transcript available on Metacast 
