Poetry For All

• Episode 87: Monica Ong, Her Gaze

  In this episode, Monica Ong joins us to discuss "Her Gaze," a visual poem that celebrates the achievements of astronomer Caroline Herschel. "Her Gaze" appears in Planetaria, Ong's new collection that merges archival materials with striking lyric poems. Monica Ong is the author of two books: Silent Anatomies (https://korepress.org/product/silent-anatomies-by-monica-ong), which was the winner of the Kore Press First Book Award in 2015; and Planetaria, which will be released in May 2025. Last year, Ong was named a United States Artists Fellow. Ong’s visual poetry has been published in many literary magazines and exhibited in galleries and museums all over the world. To learn more about Ong's work, please visit her website (https://www.monicaong.com/). To purchase a copy of Planetaria, visit the Proxima Vera website (https://www.proximavera.com/publication).

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• Episode 86: Gwendolyn Bennett, I Build America

  Gwendolyn Bennett was a poet, journalist, editor, and activist whose contributions helped to fuel the Harlem Renaissance. In this episode, we read "I Build America," a poem that exposes and critiques the exploitation and suffering of ordinary workers. To learn more about Gwendolyn Bennett, see Heroine of the Harlem Renaissance and Beyond: Gwendolyn Bennett's Selected Writings (https://www.psupress.org/books/titles/978-0-271-08096-3.html?srsltid=AfmBOoq8tb3m52BjI0wdtoiguILdKqt-HT2PdahVAq938K08Uj20668V), edited by Belinda Wheeler and Louis J. Parascandola (Pennsylvania State University Press, 2018). Thanks to Pennsylvania State University Press for granting us permission to read this poem. You can also click here (https://poets.org/poet/gwendolyn-bennett) to read a brief biography of Bennett.

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• Episode 85: Jacob Stratman, To Momento Mori

  In this episode, we read and discuss a poem that takes its inspiration from a painting by Andrew Wyeth. The poem provides a meditation on what we perceive and interpret when we look at a painting, and at one another.

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• Episode 84: Ted Kooser, excerpts from Winter Morning Walks

  In this episode, we offer close readings of poems from Ted Kooser's_ Winter Morning Walks: 100 Postcards to Jim Harrison_. Kooser's poems allow us to think about the poem as a social act, as a form of healing, and as a kind of meditation. To learn more about Ted Kooser, visit his website (https://www.tedkooser.net/). If you like these poems that we discussed in this episode, please read Ted Kooser's Winter Morning Walks: 100 Postcards to Jim Harrison (https://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/distributed/W/bo43505466.html) (Carnegie Mellon University Press, 2001). Thanks to Carnegie Mellon Press for granting us permission to read these poems aloud.

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• Episode 83: Emily Dickinson, "I went to thank Her–"

  In this episode, we read and discuss Emily Dickinson's poem about the death of Elizabeth Barrett Browning. We discuss Dickinson's innovative syntax, her use of deep pauses, and her meditations on death and grief that create surprising effects in this short lyric. I went to thank Her I went to thank Her— But She Slept— Her Bed—a funneled Stone— With Nosegays at the Head and Foot— That Travellers—had thrown— Who went to thank Her— But She Slept— 'Twas Short—to cross the Sea— To look upon Her like—alive— But turning back—'twas slow—

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