The New Yorker: Poetry

Erika Meitner joins Kevin Young to read “What Work Is,” by Philip Levine, and her own poem “To Gather Together.” Meitner's books include “Useful Junk” and “Holy Moly Carry Me,” which won the 2018 National Jewish Book Award in Poetry. She is currently a Mandel Institute Cultural Leadership Program Fellow, and she's the director of the M.F.A. program in creative writing at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

David St. John joins Kevin Young to read “Picking Grapes in an Abandoned Vineyard,” by Larry Levis, and his own poem “The Shore.” St. John is the author of many poetry collections and the recipient of honors including the Rome Fellowship and an Award in Literature from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, the O. B. Hardison Prize from the Folger Shakespeare Library, and the George Drury Smith Award from Beyond Baroque. He's also the editor of “Swirl & Vortex,” a volume of collected poems by the late Larry Levis, forthcoming in 2026. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

Edward Hirsch joins Kevin Young to read, “96 Vandam,” by Gerald Stern, and his own poem “Man on a Fire Escape.” Hirsch's honors include a MacArthur Fellowship, a National Book Critics Circle Award, the Pablo Neruda International Presidential Medal of Honor, and a National Jewish Book Award. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

Jericho Brown joins Kevin Young to read, “When,” by Elizabeth Alexander, and his own poem, “Colosseum.” Jericho Brown, who received the 2020 Pulitzer Prize in poetry for his collection “The Tradition.” He's a 2024 MacArthur Fellow and a Chancellor of the Academy of American Poets. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

This year, The New Yorker turns one hundred years old, and, to celebrate the occasion, we're publishing an anthology: “A Century of Poetry in The New Yorker, 1925-2025.” Deborah Garrison, a poet and an editor at Knopf, who worked closely with The New Yorker on this exciting project, joins Kevin Young to discuss the anthology. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

Dobby Gibson joins Kevin Young to read “I have slept in many places, for years on mattresses that entered,” by Diane Seuss, and his own poem “This Is a Test of the Federal Emergency Management Agency Wireless Warning System.” Gibson is the author of five poetry collections, including, most recently, “Hold Everything.” He's also the recipient of fellowships from the Lannan Foundation, the McKnight Foundation, the Jerome Foundation, and the Minnesota State Arts Board. Learn about your ad choices: dovetail.prx.org/ad-choices

Rae Armantrout joins Kevin Young to read “Mother,” by Dorothea Lasky, and her own poem “Finally.” Armantrout's many books include “Go Figure,” “Finalists,” “Conjure,” and “Wobble.” Her collection “Versed” won a National Book Critics Circle Award and the 2010 Pulitzer Prize for Poetry.

Jim Moore joins Kevin Young to read “I wonder if I will miss the moss,” by Jane Mead, and his own poem “Mother.” Moore has published eight poetry collections, including, most recently, “Prognosis.” He is the recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship and multiple Minnesota Book Awards.

Amber Tamblyn joins Kevin Young to read “The Dahlias,” by Didi Jackson, and her own poem “This Living.” Tamblyn, a writer, director, and actor, is the creator of the newsletter “Listening in the Dark” and the editor of an anthology of the same title.

Valzhyna Mort joins Kevin Young to read “Testimonies” by Victoria Amelina, which Mort translated from the Ukrainian, and “Map,” by Wisława Szymborska, which was translated, from the Polish, by Clare Cavanagh. Mort's collection “Music for the Dead and Resurrected” won the 2021 International Griffin Poetry Prize and the 2022 UNT Rilke Prize. Her other honors include a 2021 Rome Prize in literature and fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation, the Lannan Foundation, and the Amy Clampitt Fund.

Raymond Antrobus joins Kevin Young to read “A Protactile Version of ‘Tintern Abbey,' ” by John Lee Clark, and his own poem “Signs, Music.” Antrobus has received the Rathbones Folio Prize, the Ted Hughes Award from the Poetry Society, the Sunday Times Young Writer of the Year Award, the Lucille Clifton Legacy Award, and a Somerset Maugham Award, among other honors. 

Amy Woolard joins Kevin Young to read “Via Negativa,” by Charles Wright, and her own poem “Late Shift.” Woolard, whose debut poetry collection, “Neck of the Woods,” won the 2018 Alice James Award from Alice James Books. She is the recipient of fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Vermont Studio Center, and the Breadloaf Writers' Conference, she's also a civil-rights attorney and the chief program officer for the ACLU of Virginia.

We have a special episode to share with you today of the daily poetry podcast, “The Slowdown.” “The Slowdown” offers a poem and a moment of reflection in short episodes, each weekday. In this episode, host Major Jackson, reads “Chaos Theory” by Clint Smith. Major writes… “Occasionally, I try to follow the series of decisions that led me to this present, however triumphant or painful. My life wavers between fate and destiny. But then again, poetry brings me to the belief that some mysterious force is at work, below, that unveils a spiritually deeper meaning to it all.”If you'd like to hear more episodes of “The Slowdown,” you can learn more at slowdownshow.org and listen wherever you get your podcasts.

José Antonio Rodríguez joins Kevin Young to read “[World of the future, we thirsted](https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2019/07/29/world-of-the-future-we-thirsted),” by Naomi Shihab Nye, and his own poem “[Tender](https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2022/08/22/tender).” Rodríguez is a poet, memoirist, and translator whose honors include a Bob Bush Memorial Award from the Texas Institute of Letters and a Discovery Award from the Writers' League of Texas. He teaches in the M.F.A. program at the University of Texas, Rio Grande Valley.

Ada Limón joins Kevin Young to read “You Belong to The World,” by Carrie Fountain, and her own poem “Hell or High Water.” Limón is the current United States Poet Laureate and the recipient of a MacArthur “Genius” Fellowship. She's the author of six books—including “The Carrying,” which won the National Book Critics Circle Award for poetry—and the editor of the forthcoming anthology “You Are Here: Poetry in the Natural World.

Donika Kelly joins Kevin Young to read “One Hundred White-Sided Dolphins on a Summer Day,” by Mary Oliver, and her own poem “Sixteen Center.” Kelly is the author of two poetry collections, and the recipient of an Anisfield-Wolf Book Award, a Cave Canem Poetry Prize, a Hurston/Wright Legacy Award, and a Kate Tufts Discovery Award. A founding member of the collective Poets at the End of the World, she teaches at the University of Iowa.

Richie Hofmann joins Kevin Young to read “Twilight,” by Henri Cole, and his own poem “French Novel” Hofmann is the author of two collections of poetry and the recipient of a Ruth Lilly Fellowship from the Poetry Foundation and a Wallace Stegner Fellowship from Stanford University

Bianca Stone joins Kevin Young to read “Learning to Read,” by Franz Wright, and her own poem “What's Poetry Like?” Stone has published several books of poetry and poetry comics, including, most recently, “What Is Otherwise Infinite.” She runs the Ruth Stone House in Vermont, hosts the podcast “Ode & Psyche,” and serves as Editor at Large for Iterant Magazine.

Evie Shockley joins Kevin Young to read “Hattie McDaniel Arrives at the Coconut Grove,” by Rita Dove, and her own poem “the blessings.” Shockley is the author of six poetry collections and the Zora Neale Hurston Distinguished Professor of English at Rutgers University. Her honors include the 2023 Shelley Memorial Award from the Poetry Society of America, a Lannan Literary Award, the Stephen Henderson Award, and, twice, the Hurston/Wright Legacy Award in Poetry.

Dorothea Lasky joins Kevin Young to read “Three Songs,” by Louise Bogan, and her own poem “The Green Lake.” Lasky is the author of several books of poetry and prose, including her forthcoming collection “The Shining.” She's the co-creator, with Alex Dimitrov, of Astro Poets, and she teaches poetry at Columbia University.

Diane Mehta joins Kevin Young to read “The Lost Art of Letter Writing,” by Eavan Boland, and her own poem “Landscape with Double Bow.” Mehta is the author of the poetry collection “Forest with Castanets” and the forthcoming “Tiny Extravaganzas,” and the recipient of the Peter Heinegg Literary Award, as well as of grants and fellowships from the Cafe Royal Cultural Foundation, Civitella Ranieri, and Yaddo.

Adrienne Su joins Kevin Young to read “The Longing to Be Saved,” by Maxine Kumin, and her own poem “The Days.” Su is a professor and Poet-in-Residence at Dickinson College, whose work has been recognized by the National Endowment for the Arts, the Pushcart Prize, and the Money for Women/Barbara Deming Memorial Fund.

David Baker joins Kevin Young to read “In Passing,” by Stanley Plumly, and his own poem “Six Notes.” Baker has received honors and awards from the Guggenheim Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts, and the Theodore Roethke Memorial Foundation. He served as poetry editor of the Kenyon Review for more than twenty-five years, and he teaches at Denison University, in Ohio.

Kate Baer joins Kevin Young to read “The Morning After,” by Ellen Bass, and her own poem “Mixup.” Baer is the New York Times bestselling author of three poetry collections, including, most recently “And Yet.”

When the poet Robin Coste Lewis discovered a trove of photographs under her late grandmother's bed, she recognized them not only as a document of her family's history during the Great Migration, but also as a testament to Black intimacy and ingenuity across generations. From studio portraits to snapshots, tintypes to Polaroids, these pictures provide the foundation of Robin's latest book, “To the Realization of Perfect Helplessness,” excerpts from which were published on newyorker.com. Robin Coste Lewis formerly served as poet laureate of Los Angeles, and her debut collection, “Voyage of the Sable Venus,” won the 2015 National Book Award for poetry.

Sandra Cisneros joins Kevin Young to read “Shelter,” by José Antonio Rodríguez, and her own poem “Tea Dance, Provincetown, 1982.” Cisneros is the recipient of a 2022 Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize, a National Medal of Arts, the Ford Foundation's Art of Change Fellowship, and the PEN/Nabokov Award for Achievement in International Literature.

Diane Seuss joins Kevin Young to read “Ode,” by Jane Huffman, and her own poem “Gertrude Stein.” Seuss is the winner of the 2022 Pulitzer Prize for Poetry and the same year's National Book Critics Circle Award for her collection “frank: sonnets.” Her honors also include a Guggenheim Fellowship and the 2021 John Updike Award from the American Academy of Arts and Letters.

Saeed Jones joins Kevin Young to read “The Wind Blows Through the Doors of My Heart,” by Deborah Digges, and his own poem “A Spell to Banish Grief.” Jones's work has received the Kirkus Prize for Nonfiction, the PEN/Joyce Osterweil Award for Poetry, and a Stonewall Book Award.

Eileen Myles joins Kevin Young to read “Without,” by Joy Harjo, and their own poem “Dissloution.” Myles has published more than twenty books of poetry and prose. Their honors include the Publishing Triangle's 2020 Bill Whitehead Lifetime Achievement Award, an American Academy of Arts and Letters Award, multiple Lambda Literary Awards, and a Guggenheim Fellowship.

Christian Wiman joins Kevin Young to discuss “Far from Kingdoms” and “Outside, In Fact, There Wasn't Any Change,” by Patrizia Cavalli, translated by Judith Baumel, and his own poem “Eating Grapes Downward.” Wiman is a poet, essayist, editor, and translator, whose honors include the 2016 Aiken Taylor Award for Modern American Poetry, and the 2020 Lifetime Achievement Award from the Conference on Christianity and Literature.

Amanda Gorman joins Kevin Young to read “Declaration,” by Tracy K. Smith, and her own poem “Ship's Manifest.” Gorman served as the first-ever National Youth Poet Laureate, received a 2020 Poets & Writers Barnes & Noble Writers for Writers Award, and, in 2021, became the youngest inaugural poet in U.S. history.

Aria Aber joins Kevin Young to read “Half Light,” by Frank Bidart, and her own poem “Dirt and Light.” Aber is a Whiting Award recipient, a current Wallace Stegner Fellow at Stanford University, and the author of “Hard Damage,” which won the Prairie Schooner Book Prize in Poetry.

Forrest Gander joins Kevin Young to read “Privacy,” by Ada Limón, and his own poem “Post-Fire Forest.” Gander is a Chancellor of the Academy of American Poets, a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and the winner of a Pulitzer Prize for his collection “Be With.”

In a special episode of the Poetry Podcast, Kimiko Hahn, Monica Youn, Paul Tran, and Megan Fernandes join Kevin Young to read their work, and to discuss Asian-American poetics and the role of poetry in our tumultuous times. Kimiko Hahn, a distinguished professor at Queens College, City University of New York, has received a Guggenheim Fellowship and a Shelley Memorial Award from the Poetry Society of America. She has published ten books of poems, including, most recently, “Foreign Bodies.” Monica Youn, a former lawyer and a member of the Racial Imaginary Institute, teaches at Princeton. The recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship and the William Carlos Williams Award from the Poetry Society of America, she will publish a new book of poems, “From From,” in 2023. Paul Tran, a Wallace Stegner Fellow at Stanford University, has received a Ruth Lilly and Dorothy Sargent Rosenberg Fellowship from the Poetry Foundation, and a 92Y Discovery/Boston Review Poetry Prize. Their debut poetry collection, “All the Flowers Kneeling,” will be published in 2022. Megan Fernandes is an assistant professor of English and writer-in-residence at Lafayette College. A finalist for the Kundiman Book Prize and the Saturnalia Book Prize, her most recent poetry collection is “Good Boys.”

Toi Derricotte joins Kevin Young to read “We Feel Now a Largeness Coming On,” by Tracy K. Smith, and her own poem “I give in to an old desire.” Derricotte is a poet, memoirist, and co-founder, with Cornelius Eady, of the literary organization Cave Canem. Her honors include the PEN/Voelcker Award for Poetry and the Paterson Poetry Prize for Sustained Literary Achievement; in 2020, she received the Poetry Society of America’s Frost Medal, for distinguished lifetime achievement in poetry.

Margaret Atwood joins Kevin Young to read “A Stranger,” by Saeed Jones, and her own poem “Flatline.” Atwood, a prolific poet and novelist, is known for brilliant books such as “The Handmaid’s Tale” and “The Blind Assassin.” Her many distinctions include the Los Angeles Times Innovator’s Award, the Franz Kafka Prize, the pen Center U.S.A.’s lifetime-achievement award, and not one but two Booker Prizes, most recently for “The Testaments.” “Dearly,” her first collection of poetry in more than a decade, came out in November.

Arthur Sze joins Kevin Young to read “The Problem of Describing Trees,” by Robert Hass, and his own poem “Vectors.” Sze has received the Landon Literary Award, the Jackson Poetry Prize and, in 2019, the National Book Award in Poetry.

Joy Harjo joins Kevin Young to read “Still-Life with Potatoes, Pearls, Raw Meat, Rhinestones, Lard, and Horse Hooves,” by Sandra Cisneros, and her own poem “Running.” Harjo is the current Poet Laureate of the United States, as well as a chancellor of the Academy of American Poets. Her many honors include the Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize and the Wallace Stevens Award.

In a special episode of the Poetry Podcast, Tracy K. Smith, Marilyn Nelson, and Terrance Hayes join Kevin Young to read their work, and to discuss its relationship to protest and liberation. Tracy K. Smith served two terms as a U.S. poet laureate, and has won an Anisfield-Wolf Book Award and a Pulitzer prize. Her latest collection is “Wade in the Water.” Marilyn Nelson writes poetry for adults, young adults, and children. Her honors include a Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize, an N. S. K. Neustadt Prize for Children’s Literature, and a Frost Medal from the Poetry Society of America. Her new books, “Papa’s Free Day Party” and “Lubaya’s Quiet Roar,” are forthcoming. Terrance Hayes, a former MacArthur fellow, has won a Pegasus Award for Poetry Criticism, a Hurston/Wright Award for Poetry, and a National Book Award in Poetry. His most recent publications include “To Float In The Space Between: Drawings and Essays in Conversation with Etheridge Knight” and “American Sonnets for My Past And Future Assassin.”

Clarence Major joins Kevin Young to read “Downpour,” by Billy Collins, and his own poem “Hair.” Major’s recent honors include a PEN Oakland Reginald Lockett Lifetime Achievement Award and a Lifetime Achievement Award in the fine arts from the Congressional Black Caucus foundation. 

Elisa Gonzalez joins Kevin Young to read “Gathering Apricots,” by Czeslaw Milosz, translated by Robert Hass, and her own poem “Failed Essay on Privilege.” Gonzalez was recently a Fulbright scholar in Poland, and her work has received support from the Norman Mailer Foundation and the Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference.

Ben Purkert joins Kevin Young to read “Notes on the Reality of the Self,” by Jorie Graham, and his own poem “News.” Purkert began contributing poetry to The New Yorker in 2012, and his début poetry collection, “For the Love of Endings,” was published in 2018. 

Kwame Dawes joins Kevin Young to read “The Season of Phantasmal Peace,” by Derek Walcott, and his own poem “Before Winter.” Dawes is the author of over twenty books of poetry, fiction, and nonfiction. His many honors include a 2019 Windham Campbell Prize, a Guggenheim Fellowship, a Barnes and Noble Writers for Writers Award, and the Ford Prize for Poetry.

Ellen Bass joins Kevin Young to read “Quahogs,” by Frank X. Gaspar, and her own poem “Because.” A chancellor of the Academy of American Poets, Bass has received the Lambda Literary Award for poetry, the Pablo Neruda Prize for poetry, and fellowships from the California Arts Council and the National Endowment for the Arts. 

Mary Jo Bang joins Kevin Young to to discuss her translation of Dante’s Purgatorio, excerpts of which are featured on newyorker.com. Bang is a poet who has received the National Book Critics Circle Award, a Hodder Fellowship, a Guggenheim Fellowship, and a Berlin Prize Fellowship. Her latest book is “A Doll for Throwing.”

Shane McCrae joins Kevin Young to to discuss his poetry sequence “Jim Limber in Heaven,” featured on newyorker.com. McCrae is a poet whose whose work has received such honors as a Whiting Award, an Anisfield-Wolf Book Award, and a Lannan Literary Award. He was also a finalist for the National Book Award.