Tag: poems

Friday Five: recent reads, watches, and listens

Happy Friday, readers! Here are five things that have captured my attention lately:

  1. Reading: My friend and neighbor Agnes Vojta‘s latest collection of poetry, Love Song to Gravity. Agnes is a poet and a physicist, so the title of this collection makes sense. In Love Song…, Agnes explores grief, nature, the change of seasons, time, love, and many other things that make us human and connect us to each other and to our world, including, of course, gravity. You can read some selected poems from this book, and listen to Agnes read some of them. You can also read, right here on this website, my Friday Five Q&A with Agnes from March 2024.
  2. Watching: A great, short (under 10-minute) TED Talk titled “A meditation on Rumi and the power of poetry,” delivered in December 2023 by Iranian-born author and translator Leili Anvar. In this talk, she reflects on the poetry of Rumi, a 13th-century mystic Persian poet, and the power of poetry and language.
  3. Listening to: This podcast interview by organizational psychologist Adam Grant with the very funny Ed Helms (who played Andy Bernard, aka the ‘Nard Dog, on The Office) about learning through failure, with mentions of Helms’ book about failure, SNAFU: The Definitive Guide to History’s Greatest Screwups. Helms cut his teeth as a standup comedian, and if there’s any occupation that submits itself to failure and humiliation more regularly than a writer, it’s that of standup comedian. I recommend every writer give this a listen.
  4. Reading: Debuting at 70, an essay by Ruth Bonapace, who published her debut novel, The Bulgarian Training Manual, last year as a newly minted septuagenarian. (I’m closing in on age 65, so there’s hope for me yet.)
  5. Reading and listening to: Handmade Playlist Box Set: The Complete Works of Summer, a nostalgia-inducing essay by writer and music lover Michael Chabon (The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay, Wonder Boys, The Mysteries of Pittsburgh, etc.) on the music of summer seasons past and present, complete with Spotify playlists. (This reminds me: years ago, before I moved on to Apple Music for much of my listening, I put together a summer playlist of my own, called #summersongs, and made it open for collaboration, so if you want to add to it, feel free to do so. Or just have a listen if you’re so inclined, and marvel at my impeccable taste in music.)

Have a good weekend, and try to enjoy these waning days of summer.

Top image: Me poolside with my copy of Agnes Vojta’s latest collection of poems, Love Song to Gravity.

New (and free) ‘Live and Let DEI’ anthology turns banned words into poetry

Image of the cover for the poetry anthology 'Live and Let DEI: Poems That6 Draw on the U.S. Government's New "Forbidden Words"'

When the world and everything in it becomes toxic and chaotic, I often turn to works of poetry for solace and insight. And it’s during such times that poets often rise to the challenges of taking a stand against the ascent of totalitarianism and fascism. They emerge as a culture’s moral compass, as prophets and advocates for change, for reformation, for revolution, and it’s important that these voices have a space to be shared.

Last April, Winning Writers launched a project to provide such a space. The website issued a call for poetry that incorporated words and phrases the U.S. government has banned for a new anthology that was published earlier this week. You can download a PDF of the anthology, Live and Let DEI: Poems That Draw on the U.S. Government’s New ‘Forbidden Words’, free of charge.

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