Don McKay — Neanderthal Dig
Don McKay’s poem “Neanderthal Dig” begins with the discovery of an ancient, child-sized skeleton placed on the wing of a swan and then takes flight, showing us how love and death are riddled with para...
20 Jan 202514min
Ernesto Cardenal — Give Ear to My Words (Psalm 5)
When dictatorial leaders use talk of peace as a smokescreen to conceal their plans for war and destruction, what are the people to do? Believe in a vision of peace and freedom that is muscular, sturd...
13 Jan 202517min
Diego Báez — Inheritance
Many people say their experience of time changes after they have children, a phenomenon that Diego Báez captures in “Inheritance.” In this poem, a past, present, and future starring the same child shi...
20 Dec 202420min
Danielle Chapman — Trespassing with Tweens
Wonder and strangeness commingle with the commonplace and universal in Danielle Chapman’s “Trespassing with Tweens.” In a not-quite mirroring, a human mother and her children stand and watch together ...
16 Dec 202416min
Richard Langston — Hill walk
In Richard Langston’s poem “Hill walk,” he proffers a handful of things that move us over the course of a day — words said or read, notes played, the sight of halting steps taken by a sibling. We marv...
13 Dec 202412min
Robert Hayden — Those Winter Sundays
What sacrifices were made by your parents when you were a child? How did you think about them as they were happening? And how do you think about them now? In his poem “Those Winter Sundays,” Robert Ha...
9 Dec 202412min
Taylor Johnson — Pennsylvania Ave. SE
When you look at people who are younger than you — particularly teenagers — does your mind ever take you back to yourself at their age? Taylor Johnson’s poem “Pennsylvania Ave. SE” performs this feat ...
6 Dec 202413min
