Who is in your chosen family? This poem considers the lines of loyalty in families and how particular memories, like a grandmother keeping “wishbones from chicken carcasses / in an empty margarine container on top of the fridge,” can be a portal to love. The nan in this poem is a character of generosity and permission, and we imagine her through stories of trips, funerals, and visits. Tayi Tibble – (Te Whānau-ā-Apanui/Ngāti Porou) is a writer and poet who lives in Wellington, New Zealand. In 201...
Nov 13, 2020•14 min•Ep 14•Transcript available on Metacast What have you had to explore on your own? What, or who, helped? This poem explores the archetype of the cave — a cave that calls, a cave that contains secrets and perhaps even information. “Someone standing at the mouth had / the idea to enter. To go further / than light or language could / go.” The poem manages — at once — to convey the bravery of exploration and the solitude and possibility that can accompany such journeys. Paul Tran – is the recipient of a Ruth Lilly and Dorothy Sargent Rosen...
Nov 10, 2020•12 min•Ep 13•Transcript available on Metacast What do you notice about how you behave in times of conflict? Do you tend toward avoidance? Or compromise? Or collaboration? Or competition? Or accommodation? This poem describes a conflict between neighbors: a tree hangs over a fence. The owners love this tree; their neighbors don’t. Somebody responds directly, somebody else avoids, a chainsaw appears. Suddenly this conflict becomes a parable for all conflicts, illustrating how deep they can go and how often they cannot be resolved with a quest...
Nov 06, 2020•16 min•Ep 12•Transcript available on Metacast How do you hold onto hope? And who helped you find it? This poem is about holding onto paradise in the midst of an environment that seeks to steal or quash it. Roger Robinson praises his grandmother who told him to “carry it always / on my person, concealed.” His deft language helps us understand that paradise is a quality of life; and, even deeper than that, paradise is your life. Roger Robinson is a writer and performer who lives between London and Trinidad. His first full poetry collection, T...
Nov 02, 2020•12 min•Ep 11•Transcript available on Metacast In times of isolation, what stories have you turned to for comfort? This poem is an exploration of isolation as seen through the mythical Irish character, Suibhne. Suibhne was cursed and lived a life on the move, a transitory isolation. In the midst of the sadness at all he’s missed, he also sees beauty — and he holds both sadness and appreciation together. Seán Hewitt was born in 1990 and studied English at the University of Cambridge. He is a fiction reviewer for The Irish Times and a Leverhul...
Oct 30, 2020•13 min•Ep 10•Transcript available on Metacast What is the story of your name? In this poem , the poet calls on place, ancestors, and history to bear witness to the dignity of their name. They recall how their ancestors “acknowledged my roots grew in two / places” and how their name “is the definition of resilience.” With Black/Indigenous, Pasifika, and West Asian heritage, the poet speaks to those who mispronounce their name: “Say it right or don’t say it at all / for I am Meleika.” Meleika Gesa-Fatafehi is a Black/Indigenous, Pasifika, and...
Oct 26, 2020•14 min•Ep 9•Transcript available on Metacast In strength and defiance, Lucille Clifton celebrates her Black body and her survival. When have you said or heard words like this? Calling herself “both nonwhite and woman,” Lucille Clifton glories in her shape and fact of her life in these two poems . She invites the reader to witness everything she's lived through, and to celebrate the flourishing life that she has created in spite of everything that has tried to kill her. Lucille Clifton was the author of several books of poetry including Ble...
Oct 23, 2020•13 min•Ep 8•Transcript available on Metacast How do you speak of — and to — your body? This is a poem dedicated to the body. “The body is a nation I have never known,” Chris Abani writes. Throughout the 21 lines of this work, he describes lungs, skin, bone, touch, smells, sweat, armpits and hunger. For all the embodiedness of the poem, there is disembodiedness too: the poem continues to question how to truly be in your own body. Chris Abani is a novelist, poet, essayist, screenwriter and playwright. Born in Nigeria to an Igbo father and En...
Oct 19, 2020•12 min•Ep 7•Transcript available on Metacast Are there places you've lived or visited that others would disregard? What do you see in them that others might miss?" This poem takes place at night, describing a scene from a town on the edge of a city. The poet feels at home in a “nowhere” town, with cattle pacing in the fields, boarded houses, and rowdy filling stations. This is a place that through the eyes of some would be considered a “shit town,” but to the poet it is home. Molly McCully Brown is the author of The Virginia State Colony F...
Oct 16, 2020•13 min•Ep 6•Transcript available on Metacast Is there a character (from history, politics, or literature) whose story you want to tell from a new perspective? This poem is told from the point of view of “Lot’s wife,” a biblical character who was turned into salt because she looked back to see the burning of Sodom, her home city. The poet shows us what Lot’s wife sees: towers swaying, guitars popping, dogs weeping and roosters howling. By mixing the modern with the everlasting, Lot’s wife is humanized and justified. Natalie Diaz is Mojave a...
Oct 12, 2020•15 min•Ep 5•Transcript available on Metacast Were you born during a time when laws were different? What impact did those laws have on you? In this poem, Natasha Trethewey recalls the story of how her parents crossed state lines to wed because Mississippi forbade interracial marriage at the time. It is written in the form of a ghazal , with birth and belonging, names and death coming together. Natasha Trethewey served as U.S. Poet Laureate from 2012-2014. She is the author of a memoir, Memorial Drive , and five collections of poetry includi...
Oct 09, 2020•11 min•Ep 4•Transcript available on Metacast Is there a moment of beauty you can recall that’s like a blessing for you? This poem takes place at twilight in a field just off the highway to Rochester, Minnesota, where the poet and a friend encounter two ponies who come “gladly out of the willows / To welcome my friend and me.” James Wright was a fellow of the Academy of American Poets and taught at he University of Minnesota, Macalester College, and New York City's Hunter College. He also served in the U.S. Army, and was stationed in Japan ...
Oct 05, 2020•12 min•Ep 3•Transcript available on Metacast What’s a chance encounter in a city that’s never left you? In this poem the speaker is asked a question by a stranger while standing near the water outside the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City. “Pardon me Old School he / says you know is this a wishing well?” He initially brushes off the stranger, but something happens: a shared coin, a well, a wish that is answered as it is made. Gregory Pardlo won the 2015 Pulitzer Prize for Poetry for his collection Digest . He is poetry editor of ...
Oct 02, 2020•16 min•Ep 2•Transcript available on Metacast What stories or myths bring you strength? This poem tells the story of a person living with invisible chronic pain who finds unexpected fortitude from a girl dressed as a superhero. Their encounter, “at the swell of the muddy Mississippi,” doesn’t have a fantasy ending, but instead finds strength and glory in bodies and myth. Ada Limón is the author of five books of poetry, including The Carrying , which won the National Book Critics Circle Award for Poetry and was named one of the best poetry b...
Sep 28, 2020•16 min•Ep 1•Transcript available on Metacast Poetry Unbound with host Pádraig Ó Tuama is back on Monday, Sept. 28. Featured poets in this season include Lucille Clifton, James Wright, Natasha Trethewey, Christian Wiman, Layli Long Soldier and more. New episodes released every Monday and Friday through the fall. Subscribe on Apple Podcasts , Spotify , Google Podcasts, Overcast , or wherever you listen....
Sep 14, 2020•2 min•Transcript available on Metacast In Leanne O’Sullivan’s poem “ Leaving Early ,” the poet writes to her ill husband, entrusting him into the care of a nurse named Fionnuala. As the novel coronavirus sweeps the globe, many of us can’t physically be there for loved ones who are sick. Instead, it is the health care workers — and all involved in the health care system — who are tirelessly present, caring for others in spite of exhaustion and the risk it brings to their own wellbeing. We offer this episode of Poetry Unbound in profou...
Apr 03, 2020•12 min•Ep 19•Transcript available on Metacast Poetry Unbound will be back with new episodes this fall. We’re so grateful to those who welcomed the podcast into their lives, and we’d love to hear more about your listening experience. What did you love? What can we improve? And what poetry, poets, or topics would you like to hear host Pádraig Ó Tuama talk about? Take the short survey at onbeing.org/pusurvey .
Mar 23, 2020•1 min•Ep 18•Transcript available on Metacast Emily Dickinson’s poem “1383” honors the friendships that endure across time, circumstance, and even misunderstanding. Akin to fire, the connections in these friendships may be strong enough to burn or hurt us, but Dickinson acknowledges that their light continues to draw us in regardless. After listening, we invite you to reflect on this question: Think about a friendship that has remained steady for you across the years, even as both of you have changed. Why do you think your relationship has ...
Mar 20, 2020•7 min•Ep 17•Transcript available on Metacast Raymond Antrobus’s poem “ Miami Airport ” bears witness to the disempowerment that comes when you’re not believed. The voice of the poet is absent, and all we hear is an interrogator seeking to disrupt and displace. This space of suspicion creates anxiety, transporting us to the places and times when someone has questioned the truth of our story. A question to reflect on after you listen: When have you felt disempowered by questions about yourself? Did you find your voice again? How? About the P...
Mar 16, 2020•10 min•Ep 16•Transcript available on Metacast Patrick Kavanagh’s poem “ The One ” is about seeing beauty in the ordinary places of home. One of Ireland’s most famous poets, Kavanagh grew up in rural County Monaghan and moved to Dublin as a young man. This poem revisits the boglands of his home, which he once hated but came to love. A question to reflect on after you listen: Think about where you’re from. How has your understanding of it changed over time? About the Poet: Patrick Kavanagh was a prominent Irish poet and writer who died in 196...
Mar 13, 2020•8 min•Ep 15•Transcript available on Metacast Ali Cobby Eckermann’s poem “ Kulila ” insists on remembering as a moral act. Through the poem, the Aboriginal poet mourns the loss of Indigenous cultures in Australia and how they have been damaged and changed by colonization. Cobby Eckermann calls her readers to a place of listening and lament as a way to keep alive the memory of who we are and who we could’ve been. A question to reflect on after you listen: What in your culture or community needs to be lamented, honored, and told? About the Po...
Mar 09, 2020•9 min•Ep 14•Transcript available on Metacast Kei Miller’s poem “ Book of Genesis ” asks us to imagine a God who makes things spring into life specifically for us. Just as the poet of Genesis proclaims, “Let there be,” Miller wonders what freedom and flourishing we’d find in imagining a “Let” pronounced not for the person others say we should be, but for the person we are. A question to reflect on after you listen: How can you begin to let yourself flourish today, just as you are? About the Poet: Kei Miller is a professor of English and cre...
Mar 06, 2020•6 min•Ep 13•Transcript available on Metacast Lemn Sissay’s poem “ Some Things I Like ” celebrates what we might consider discardable — like cold tea, ash trays, and even people. Raising a joyous toast to the forgotten and the forgettable, Sissay recognizes the power we give to what we pay attention to and invites us to look anew at all that has been undervalued. A question to reflect on after you listen: What is something you like that others may not value in the same way? About the Poet: Lemn Sissay is a poet, playwright, and broadcaster....
Mar 02, 2020•10 min•Ep 12•Transcript available on Metacast Joy Harjo’s poem “ Praise the Rain ” makes space to appreciate all the nuances of our lives. Echoing Rumi’s poem “The Guest House,” she asks us to be present to this moment — the crazy or the sad, the beginning or the end — to greet it all with the powerful word: “Praise.” A question to reflect on after you listen: What can you praise today? About the Poet: Joy Harjo is the 23rd poet laureate of the United States and a writer of the Muscogee (Creek) Nation. She has written nine books of poetry, ...
Feb 28, 2020•7 min•Ep 11•Transcript available on Metacast Ross Gay’s poem “ Ode to Buttoning and Unbuttoning My Shirt ” uses an everyday task to examine what is made and unmade in small moments. He imagines his fingers opening and closing things, like buttons, the eyes of a dead person, relationships. In doing so, the poem asks us to simply pay attention, today, to what we’re doing with our hands — to understand them as intimate pathways into the stories of our bodies and the stories of our lives. A question to reflect on after you listen: What have yo...
Feb 24, 2020•9 min•Ep 10•Transcript available on Metacast Allison Funk’s poem “ The Prodigal’s Mother Speaks to God ” tells the age-old story of The Prodigal Son through a new voice: the unnamed woman of the parable. This woman is truthful, wise, and loving. She knows the dedications and limitations of love. She seeks to see clearly, even though it’s hard to see clearly. A question to reflect on after you listen: When has love been complicated for you? About the Poet: Allison Funk is a distinguished professor of English at Southern Illinois University ...
Feb 21, 2020•8 min•Ep 9•Transcript available on Metacast Jane Mead’s “ Substance Abuse Trial ” is set in a courtroom where a daughter hears her father’s name mispronounced at his trial. As she watches this, she wishes that the court could see the fullness of her father and his story — to bear witness to him as a human being, defined by much more than his addiction. A question to reflect on after you listen: When was a time when you were judged based on a mistake you made, rather than the fullness of who you are? About the Poet: Jane Mead authored five...
Feb 17, 2020•9 min•Ep 8•Transcript available on Metacast Ocean Vuong’s poem “ Seventh Circle of Earth ” is an homage to the love and intimacy shared by Michael Humphrey and Clayton Capshaw, a gay couple who were murdered in their home in Dallas, Texas. In the midst of recognizing the violence and threat LGBTQI communities face, the poem holds space for tenderness — and honors their love. A question to reflect on after you listen: What examples have you seen of love and power enacted, even in the face of threat? About the poet: Ocean Vuong is an assist...
Feb 14, 2020•12 min•Ep 7•Transcript available on Metacast Tracy K. Smith’s poem “ Song ” is filled with observations of a loved person: their habits, the things they do when they think nobody is watching. Love is shown and celebrated in observing the small practices of another. A question to reflect on after you listen: What’s something small and quiet you’ve noticed about a loved one? About the poet: Tracy K. Smith is a professor of creative writing at Princeton University and the former poet laureate of the United States. Her poetry collections inclu...
Feb 10, 2020•9 min•Ep 6•Transcript available on Metacast Marie Howe’s poem “ My Mother’s Body ” is wise about age. In the poem, Marie’s mother is young enough to be Marie’s own daughter, and in this imagination there is wonder, understanding, and even forgiveness. A question to reflect on after you listen: Are there things that you have found easier to understand — or even forgive — as you’ve gotten older? About the poet: Marie Howe is a chancellor of the Academy of American Poets. She’s published four collections of poetry: What the Living Do , The G...
Feb 07, 2020•8 min•Ep 5•Transcript available on Metacast 
