Poetry For All

Episode 75: Du Fu, Passing the Night by White Sands Post Station

August 7th, 2024  |  Season 6  |  18 mins 16 secs

aging, chinese poetry, loneliness, nature poetry, night, poetry in translation, restlessness, world poetry

What is a good life, and how do we make sense of the world when it seems like society is collapsing? In this episode, Lucas Bender joins us once again to discuss the work of Du Fu, the great Chinese poet of the Tang Dynasty. Luke helps us to see how Du Fu’s “Passing the Night by White Sands Post Station” can be read in multiple ways depending on how one translates each word of the poem. In doing so, he reveals the poem’s concerns with aging, disappointment, and the possibility of hope in difficult times.

Episode 72: Victoria Chang, My Mother--died unpeacefully...

May 22nd, 2024  |  Season 6  |  20 mins 1 sec

21st century, aging, asian american, elegy, free verse, grief and loss

In this episode, we read one of Victoria Chang’s moving poems from her collection OBIT, and discuss how the poem explores the interplay between life, death, grieving, and memory as the poet tries to process her mother’s passing.

Episode 52: Shakespeare, Sonnet 73

October 24th, 2022  |  Season 5  |  19 mins 18 secs

17th century, aging, autumn, intimacy, love, night, rhymed verse, sonnet

This sonnet reflects on the autumn of life and an intimate love, and it turns on that love growing stronger in and through its age, even as the body decays.

Episode 50: Rafael Campo, Primary Care

September 26th, 2022  |  Season 5  |  22 mins 24 secs

21st century, aging, blank verse, body in pain, gratitude, hispanic heritage month, repetition or refrain, science and medicine, spirituality, wonder

In this episode, we discuss how Rafael Campo, a practicing physician, uses blank verse to explore the experience of illness and suffering.

Episode 38: Laura Van Prooyen, Elegy for My Mother's Mind

January 26th, 2022  |  Season 4  |  29 mins 16 secs

21st century, aging, children, elegy, free verse, gratitude, grief and loss, guest on the show, love, mother's day

In this episode, our guest Laura Van Prooyen reads "Elegy for My Mother's Mind," a poem that navigates the complexities of memory, loss, and familial relationships. Laura's poem gives us an opportunity to think about the deep sources of poetic inspiration, the revision process, and the power of metaphor.

Episode 24: Robert Hayden, Those Winter Sundays

June 14th, 2021  |  Season 2  |  20 mins 49 secs

20th century, aging, black history month, children, father's day, gratitude, love, sonnet, surprise, winter, wonder

Episode 16: John Milton, When I Consider How My Light is Spent

February 15th, 2021  |  Season 2  |  15 mins 57 secs

17th century, aging, anger, body in pain, christianity, grief and loss, hope, rhymed verse, sonnet, surprise

The episode explores Milton's great sonnet spun from the difficulties of middle age and new disappointments. We consider how he pulls consolation from his sense of defeat and near despair. Faced with his coming blindness, he hears the voice of Patience giving him the strength to wait.

Episode 12: James Merrill, Christmas Tree

December 2nd, 2020  |  Season 1  |  21 mins 37 secs

20th century, advent/christmas, aging, body in pain, elegy, friendship, grief and loss, guest on the show, intimacy, lgbtqia month, love, science and medicine, visual poetry