Rachel Zucker speaks with Shane McCrae, professor and author of five books, about his poetic process, what he’s working on, and the current political climate. The two discuss the limitations of the term “confessional poetry,” the difficulties of writing about tragedies in the immediate wake of their occurrences, the impulse to witness humiliation in popular culture, the American anxiety of the long poem post-Eliot, and how one might curate an “overwhelming sadness” through art. Shane McCrae reads “In the Language” from his new book In the Language of My Captor, and “Forgiveness in America” from Forgiveness Forgiveness. An audio excerpt from Shane’s newest book-length poem and two hand-picked playlists are available to Patreon subscribers of Commonplace.