Rachel Zucker speaks with poet, critic, professor, and overall poetry-immersed figure Craig Morgan Teicher. The two discuss Teicher’s various roles in the poetry community, the poetry economy, and the glimpses into people’s inner lives that poetry affords. By delving into his past as an aspiring comedian and his eventual path to poetry, Teicher offers an insight into what motivates him both professionally and personally in his current life. Through their conversation, Teicher and Zucker attempt to tease out the connections between monstrousness and pain, why certain poets like Robert Lowell are drawn to the sonnet, and how poetry allows readers and poets to connect through a solitary medium.