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American Public Media

Host Maggie Smith is your daily poetry companion. Poetry is one of the greatest tools we have to wield our own attention — to consider our own lives and the lives of others, to help us live creatively and compassionately, to use that attention to lean into wonder, and joy, and truth, and to find hope — to keep hoping. The Slowdown community knows that reflecting on a poem, every weekday, can connect us to our inner world and the world around us. Listen as you make your morning coffee, as you go on a walk in your neighborhood, as you pull away from the to-do list, as you resist the dismal, endless scroll to share five minutes of perspective through the lens of poetry, from poets old and new, well-loved and emerging onto the scene. Brought to you by American Public Media, in partnership with the Poetry Foundation.

The Slowdown: Poetry & Reflection Daily

Today’s poem is Going Home by Joan Kwon Glass. 

The Slowdown is your daily poetry ritual. In this episode, Maggie writes… “When my children tell me about their dreams, it's not uncommon for them to say, “We were at home, but it wasn’t our house,” or “I was with my friends, but they weren’t my real-life friends.” Sometimes I play a cameo role as myself, but sometimes the role of their mother is played by someone else. Dreams are strange like that. Our sleeping brains sometimes offer us alternate versions of familiar people and places.”

Celebrate the power of poems with a gift to The Slowdown today. Every donation makes a difference: https://tinyurl.com/rjm4synp

1431: Going Home by Joan Kwon Glass

Today’s poem is Earth Shovel by Dan Albergotti. 

The Slowdown is your daily poetry ritual. In this episode, Maggie writes… “Today’s poem, which looks at the fragility of our planet, begins with two epigraphs. One is from American astronomer Carl Sagan, from his book Pale Blue Dot. The other is the famous line from politician Michael Steele.” 

Celebrate the power of poems with a gift to The Slowdown today. Every donation makes a difference: https://tinyurl.com/rjm4synp

1430: Earth Shovel by Dan Albergotti

Today’s poem is Midlife Crisis by Jane Zwart. 

The Slowdown is your daily poetry ritual. In this episode, Maggie writes… “Midlife has upended everything I thought about aging. It’s not at all what I expected. Certainly, when I was a child, I thought of people in their forties as old, and now that I’m closer to 50 than 40, I laugh at that. I feel … young! I feel younger, in many ways, than I did ten years ago. I admire how today’s poem describes time, and what it feels like to reach the middle of one’s life only to be surprised at what you find.” 

Celebrate the power of poems with a gift to The Slowdown today. Every donation makes a difference: https://tinyurl.com/rjm4synp

1429: Midlife Crisis by Jane Zwart

Today’s poem is In Defense of “Candelabra with Heads” by Nicole Sealey. 

The Slowdown is your daily poetry ritual. In this episode, Maggie writes… “Today’s poem pulls back the curtain on the revision process, showing us how it’s about more than just the text on the page. The poet refers to an earlier poem of theirs, an ekphrastic poem based on a sculpture by Thomas Hirschhorn. His work “Candelabra with Heads” features mannequins bandaged in brown duct tape and hung from a wood frame. This poet revised her poem of the same name to remove the last line, but later went back and reinstated it.”

Celebrate the power of poems with a gift to The Slowdown today. Every donation makes a difference: https://tinyurl.com/rjm4synp

1428: In Defense of “Candelabra with Heads” by Nicole Sealey

Today’s poem is A toast to something beautiful flapping in the wind by J. Hope Stein. 

The Slowdown is your daily poetry ritual. In this episode, Maggie writes… “Once upon a time, I was a new mother with a baby girl in my arms, and I was her whole world. It was seventeen years ago, but sometimes I swear I can transport myself back there just by closing my eyes and taking a deep breath. I remember reading that a baby’s first three months of life are called the fourth trimester. Three trimesters are spent in the mother’s body, bobbing around like a little fish, but the ‘fourth trimester’ is when everyone is adapting to life in the outside world. The babies seem bewildered, trying to adjust to nursing and sleeping, but I think parents are just as bewildered.” 

Celebrate the power of poems with a gift to The Slowdown today. Every donation makes a difference: https://tinyurl.com/rjm4synp

1427: A toast to something beautiful flapping in the wind by J. Hope Stein

Today’s poem is One-Way Gate by Jenny George.

The Slowdown is your daily poetry ritual. In this episode, Maggie writes… “Sometimes I swear I can feel a life-changing moment as it’s happening. Some moments in life feel like walking through a doorway from one place or time into another. Like crossing a threshold. It’s often easier to see these thresholds from the other side, looking back. Retrospect is clearer than present perspective. But as I get older, I think I’m getting better at seeing significant moments as they’re happening: seeing the train doors slide open or closed. I think I’m getting better at noticing that my life is changing in real time, even if I don’t know how it will turn out.” 

Celebrate the power of poems with a gift to The Slowdown today. Every donation makes a difference: https://tinyurl.com/rjm4synp

1426: One-Way Gate by Jenny George

Today’s poem is The Ship by Bianca Stone.

The Slowdown is your daily poetry ritual. In this episode, Maggie writes… “Today’s poem feels right for today because it’s a “new year, same you” poem. Because being who you are, and nothing more, is exactly what you need to be doing—this year, next year, every year.” 

Celebrate the power of poems with a gift to The Slowdown today. Every donation makes a difference: https://tinyurl.com/rjm4synp

1425: The Ship by Bianca Stone

Today’s poem is White Hot Star by W. Todd Kaneko.

The Slowdown is your daily poetry ritual. In this episode, Maggie writes… “Today’s poem is about fathers and sons, and about loss. It is also about the small, shining parts of our lives that survive us and get passed down to the next generation.”

Celebrate the power of poems with a gift to The Slowdown today. Every donation makes a difference: https://tinyurl.com/rjm4synp

1424: White Hot Star by W. Todd Kaneko

Today’s poem is Puzzle by Randall Mann.

The Slowdown is your daily poetry ritual. In this episode, Maggie writes… “Today’s poem is a kind of mirror: the second half matches the first, in reverse. As I was reading The People’s Project submissions from contributors, I felt strongly that this poem should come last, closing the book. Perhaps, when you listen to the ending, you’ll sense why.” 

Celebrate the power of poems with a gift to The Slowdown today. Every donation makes a difference: https://tinyurl.com/rjm4synp

1423: Puzzle by Randall Mann

Today’s poem is Dear Delinquent by Ann Townsend. 

The Slowdown is your daily poetry ritual. In this episode, Maggie writes… “It’s exciting to know that I can dive deep into another human being and never touch bottom. I will never know everything there is to know. If I’m lucky, I’ll get to spend many years with the people I love, learning as much as I can, and watching them grow and change, and being surprised and delighted by them! If I’m lucky, I’ll continue to change, too, and the people who love me will be surprised and delighted by those changes.”

Celebrate the power of poems with a gift to The Slowdown today. Every donation makes a difference: https://tinyurl.com/rjm4synp

1422: Dear Delinquent by Ann Townsend

Today’s poem is Ladies' Arm Wrestling Match at the Blue Moon Diner by Jenny Johnson. 

The Slowdown is your daily poetry ritual. In this episode, Maggie writes… “Today’s poem begins with a little advice that made me smile because of its sauciness, and the poem unfolds into such a rich, detailed portrait — not a portrait of a lady, but of ladies, shedding old expectations and claiming new power.” 

Celebrate the power of poems with a gift to The Slowdown today. Every donation makes a difference: https://tinyurl.com/rjm4synp

1419: Ladies' Arm Wrestling Match at the Blue Moon Diner by Jenny Johnson

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