The Talking Poem Podcast

William Callahan on Ocean Vuong's "Beautiful Short Loser"

In this episode, William Callahan brings in Ocean Vuong's poem "Beautiful Short Loser." We talk about trans experience and the revised edition of the poem that appears in Vuong's collection Time Is a ...

29 Syys 202341min

Short Form: Robert Hayden's "Those Winter Sundays"

Several guests postponed due to illness, so here's a "Short Form" episode on sound in Robert Hayden's classic "Those Winter Sundays." I draw attention to sound effects in the poem that receive less at...

21 Syys 20237min

Short Form: The Underrated Magic of Vowels

I'm introducing a new kind of episode that I'm calling Short Form, in which I'm going solo about a poem or poems. In this episode, I talk about vowel sounds in Gerard Manley Hopkins' "God's Grandeur,"...

14 Syys 202310min

Erica Dawson on Anne Sexton's "Her Kind"

I talk with Erica Dawson (When Rap Spoke Straight to God, The Small Blades Hurt) about Anne Sexton's poem "Her Kind." We also talk about the term "confessional poetry," listen to a recording of Anne S...

8 Syys 202337min

Andrea Hollander on Catherine Barnett

I talk with poet and long-time friend Andrea Hollander (Blue Mistaken for Sky, And Now, Nowhere but Here) about Catherine Barnett's poem "Son in August." Andrea also shares a fantastic poem from her n...

1 Syys 202346min

Roger Gilbert on A. R. Ammons

I talk with critic and colleague Roger Gilbert (author of Walks in the World: Representation and Experience in Modern American Poetry and co-editor of Considering the Radiance: Essays on the Poetry of...

1 Syys 202333min

Cynthia Arrieu-King on Adam Zagajewski

I talk with Cynthia Arrieu-King (Continuity, The Betweens) about Adam Zagajewski's incredible poem "To Go to Lvov," translated by Renata Gorczynski. I also put her through the paces of an impossible g...

1 Syys 202329min