One Poem Only

A daily reading from One Poem Only—a quiet space for a single poem, read aloud.

intuitionrismPattern recognition is acognitive discipline —congenitally decided for most,congested with emotion.Not to boast, butI’m a fucking psychicfunctioning on fumes and faint tracesof a beautywho previously inhabitedthis body, this brain.I mainline cues.It’s smooth, yet dangerous —an almost cancerous paranoia.Sometimes wildly,the past is a tool used primally;utilize your history.Intuition powerfully promotes fruitionpassionately if tempted.Trust in the process promptedby your progress.

More from rism ↓

1. @bugshearyou on Instagram

Support + Stay Connected to OPO

If you’d like to support the show, Substack and Patreon members receive a copy of my book, For My Daughter, along with episodes from the audiobook.

Poetry reminds us what matters. Thank you for listening.

Mentioned in this episode:

One Poem Only submissions are open.

This round, I’m looking for poems about what remains. What stays with us when we experience change? What survives? What do we yearn to carry forward? Send me the poem you wrote and want the world to hear. Also, if you’d like to read your own poem on the podcast, you can. Submit a clear audio file recorded in a quiet space—no perfect studio recording required. And yes, your poem can have been previously published in a literary magazine, in print, or on social media. Submissions close Thursday, October 29. I’ll respond by Wednesday, November 11. Whether I read your poem or you read it yourself, I’d love to hear what you have to share.

One Poem Only Submissions Form

Wednesdays on One Poem Only are a double feature: one poem here on the podcast, and one more by the same poet shared on Instagram.

SnailLizzie Elliot-KleinIn your spiral shellyou hold the answer –slowness is radical.
From the ash pileof my burn out,I see you everywhere.
Clinging to walls,meandering through moss,criss-crossing my path.
Reaching unbelievable heightsat speeds that will win no medals –
just savouring thesilvery slownessof yourtrail.
In your spiral shellyou hold the answer –softness is strength.Inching forward on vulnerable ripples,retreating when the world is harsh,rebuilding your shell with self-made gold,
In your spiral shellyou hold the answer –I too can change.
My soft body thriving in gentlenessKintsugi shell gleamingin the light of springas I carve mycurling
silver
life trail
slowly
steadily
softly
at my own
snail’s
pace.

More from Lizzie Elliot-Klein ↓

1. @ofbrackenandbrine on Instagram

Watch the Second Poem

You can watch and listen to Belly. by Lizzie Elliot-Klein as part of our Wednesday double feature on Instagram at @rembrandts.cure.

Support + Stay Connected to OPO

If you’d like to support the show, Substack and Patreon members receive a copy of my book, For My Daughter, along with episodes from the audiobook.

Two poems. One poet. Let the words keep moving.

One Poem Only is a daily ritual: one poem, center stage, just for now.

Tony and/or ToneeNguyen Minh TriThe "y" is a hook, a barb in the ground,A heavy-set anchor, a masculine sound.It carries the dust of the fathers and sons,My father and his son.The weight of the "Tony" who follows/ who runs,A name like a suit that is tailored too tight,Designed for the sun, yet afraid of the light.To them, it’s a letter/ to me, it’s a wall,A clanking vibration that makes me feel small.But look at the "e"s: how they mirror, how they gleamA twin of silver, the space in between.Tonee is a lift, a soft-rising key,The "ee" is the breath of the person.It isn’t a label, it isn’t a chore,It’s the clicking of locks and the opening door.How do I tell them the "y" is a ghost?A version of me that I’ve long demoted.How do I tell them the "e" is the spark,The fun and the fire who glow in the dark?It’s not just a spelling, a quirk, or a claim,It’s the pulse in my throat.It’s my name.It’s my name.

More from Nguyen Minh Tri ↓

1. @tonywith2e on Instagram
2. @tonywith2e on Substack

Support + Stay Connected to OPO

If you’d like to support the show, Substack and Patreon members receive a copy of my book, For My Daughter, along with episodes from the audiobook.

Feed yourself poetry every day.

Mentioned in this episode:

One Poem Only submissions are open.

This round, I’m looking for poems about what remains. What stays with us after we experience change? What survives? What do we yearn to carry forward? Send me the poem you wrote and want the world to hear. Also, if you’d like to read your own poem on the podcast, you can. Submit a clear audio file recorded in a quiet space—no perfect studio recording required. And yes, your poem can have been previously published in a literary magazine, a book, or on social media. Submissions close Thursday, October 29. I’ll respond by Wednesday, November 11. Whether I read your poem or you read it yourself, I’d love to hear what you have to share.

One Poem Only Submissions Form

One Poem Only is a daily poetry podcast offering a quiet moment with a single poem—read aloud, without analysis or noise.

PlutocracyAlicia SwainIn kitchens drops will drip, each brown in hue,a mother will keep her son from the truth,the senate will swear there’s nothing to do,though they tout their care for the nation’s youth.A man will cast his vote at ten to noon,his ballot broken down in only two,he lives inside a fading honeymoonwith good intentions, having not a clue:disease inside him ticks just like a bomb,one year from now the hospital will close,he’ll find a plot to rest beside his mom,if only congress told him how it goes. Though women’s bodies know not rights of men, thank God the rich can clutch their wealth again.

More from Alicia Swain ↓

1. @aliciamswain on Instagram
2. @aliciamswain on Substack
3. Her book, Steel Slides and Yellow Walls, is available now

Support + Stay Connected to OPO

If you’d like to support the show, Substack and Patreon members receive a copy of my book, For My Daughter, along with episodes from the audiobook.

Poetry slows us down. Thank you for listening.

Mentioned in this episode:

One Poem Only submissions are open.

This round, I’m looking for poems about what remains. What stays with us after we experience change? What survives? What do we yearn to carry forward? Send me the poem you wrote and want the world to hear. Also, if you’d like to read your own poem on the podcast, you can. Submit a clear audio file recorded in a quiet space—no perfect studio recording required. And yes, your poem can have been previously published in a literary magazine, a book, or on social media. Submissions close Thursday, October 29. I’ll respond by Wednesday, November 11. Whether I read your poem or you read it yourself, I’d love to hear what you have to share.

One Poem Only Submissions Form

One Poem More gathers all of this week’s poems from One Poem Only—an unhurried chance to listen again, or catch what you missed.

This week’s poems

1. Operating Instructions for the Day After Your Best Friend Tells You He Supports Genocide by Jané Dowd
2. Swan Dive by Maia von Maltzahn
3. Cycles by S. Salazar
4. An Emblem of Wounds by Henry Opeyemi
5. mortal perch by Amanda Thuy
6. A Dream by Edgar Allan Poe

Plus one new one to carry us into the week ahead

Cling to MeMaggie DeversI lay on the California coastListening to the wavesLooking out to the Santa Monica mountainsAnd nestle into the earth like a loverhunting out the soft spot near your collar boneOr a toddler, shyly hiding behind your knee,peering out only to retreat into the smooth safety of a jointThe parts where we come together are the most tenderI realize as I drag my fingers through the damp sand, bits of ocean foam clinging to its surface
Life unfolds in the crevicesAt first we grow curled up and long for the pressure of the womb once we are bornThen we learn to grow by stretchingTo unfurl our limbsSo when we find ourselves in a tight spot we burrow deeper to feel safeWe grow roots that entwine with the roots of those we loveWe learn to trust the tender parts as we come together

More from Maggie Devers ↓

1. My debut poetry collection, For My Daughter, available as an audiobook.
2. Purchase a signed copy of For My Daughter or get one free by subscribing to the podcast: One Poem Only on Patreon
3. Follow me on Instagram for more poetry @rembrandts.cure

More from this week’s poets

Find links to each poet’s work, books, and social accounts in the show notes for the individual episodes.

Support + Stay Connected to OPO

If you’d like to support the show, Substack and Patreon members receive a copy of my book, For My Daughter, along with episodes from the audiobook.

Poetry is better when it’s lived with. Thank you for listening.

One Poem Only is a daily ritual: one poem, center stage, just for now.

A DreamEdgar Allan PoeIn visions of the dark nightI have dreamed of joy departedBut a waking dream of life and lightHath left me broken-hearted.
Ah! what is not a dream by dayTo him whose eyes are castOn things around him with a rayTurned back upon the past?
That holy dream that holy dream,While all the world were chiding,Hath cheered me as a lovely beam,A lonely spirit guiding.
What though that light, thro' storm and night,So trembled from afarWhat could there be more purely brightIn Truth's day star?

Support + Stay Connected to OPO

If you’d like to support the show, Substack and Patreon members receive a copy of my book, For My Daughter, along with episodes from the audiobook.

Poetry shows us what we need. Thank you for being part of the experience.

Mentioned in this episode:

One Poem Only submissions are open.

This round, I’m looking for poems about what remains. What stays with us when we experience change? What survives? What do we yearn to carry forward? Send me the poem you wrote and want the world to hear. Also, if you’d like to read your own poem on the podcast, you can. Submit a clear audio file recorded in a quiet space—no perfect studio recording required. And yes, your poem can have been previously published in a literary magazine, in print, or on social media. Submissions close Thursday, October 29. I’ll respond by Wednesday, November 11. Whether I read your poem or you read it yourself, I’d love to hear what you have to share.

One Poem Only Submissions Form

One Poem Only is a daily poetry podcast offering a quiet moment with a single poem—read aloud, without analysis or noise.

mortal perchAmanda Thuyupon a mortal perch i scribe away my lonely parts,pulled from deepest chasm of this broken heart.a treasure trove of loss and tattered dreams,befitting muse which in the dark sits agleam.
heartache wrapped in anguished words seeking sanity,mutated from once tightly held soliloquy.harrowing thoughts bleed from fissures of speaking heart,seeping through veins and through fingers now depart.all unspoken peers now into light through hope-filled ink,seeking redemption while still consuming tear-stained drink.
loneliness of my despair shall now upon all befall,mystic and cryptic script that quietly fades into ears of all.one bit of comfort as wounds float upon flutter of winds,unburdening some grief-laden poundage long kept within.

More from Amanda Thuy ↓

1. @mezzo.strada on Instagram
2. Her book, Between Love and Grief: Pet Loss and Healing through Poetry, is available now

Support + Stay Connected to OPO

If you’d like to support the show, Substack and Patreon members receive a copy of my book, For My Daughter, along with episodes from the audiobook.

Poetry sustains. Thank you for supporting the podcast.

Mentioned in this episode:

One Poem Only submissions are open.

This round, I’m looking for poems about what remains. What stays with us after we experience change? What survives? What do we yearn to carry forward? Send me the poem you wrote and want the world to hear. Also, if you’d like to read your own poem on the podcast, you can. Submit a clear audio file recorded in a quiet space—no perfect studio recording required. And yes, your poem can have been previously published in a literary magazine, a book, or on social media. Submissions close Thursday, October 29. I’ll respond by Wednesday, November 11. Whether I read your poem or you read it yourself, I’d love to hear what you have to share.

One Poem Only Submissions Form

A daily reading from One Poem Only—a quiet space for a single poem, read aloud.

An Emblem of WoundsHenry OpeyemiWe are in the middle of a conversation, thereflection of our lives upon glossy waters.We’re twice the age we used to be, shadinghome into grief, into a childhood memory.there is an ophicleide infused in the distance ofsouls, singing into the littleness of a heaven: aprayer old enough for the heaviness I have carried.a boy from my childhood recognizes me by a face I no longer wear, by a stillness that was once a scream.My world is an open wound— a phoenix burning into an undying whistle of the wind. we’re betwixt awaging war, an emblem of songs profused into the flowering of roseash, aren’t we all a singing orchestrain heaven?& we won’t stop singing until the world ends in a poem, until immortality is an endless loop ofremembrance. We stood beside the black river, washing down black memories, memorizing the eulogy ofbrown gods, a drowning nestling through the theory of names. I looked into the memory, marinated forthe ashes that were burnt to be seen, nebulous as the clouds. syntax of broken bodies wrestling forwholeness,the world won’t end without us first knowing, and the wound won’t heal without the opening ofanother body.

More from Henry Opeyemi ↓

1. @henryopeyemi_ on Instagram

Support + Stay Connected to OPO

If you’d like to support the show, Substack and Patreon members receive a copy of my book, For My Daughter, along with episodes from the audiobook.

Poetry reminds us what matters. Thank you for listening.

Mentioned in this episode:

One Poem Only submissions are open.

This round, I’m looking for poems about what remains. What stays with us when we experience change? What survives? What do we yearn to carry forward? Send me the poem you wrote and want the world to hear. Also, if you’d like to read your own poem on the podcast, you can. Submit a clear audio file recorded in a quiet space—no perfect studio recording required. And yes, your poem can have been previously published in a literary magazine, in print, or on social media. Submissions close Thursday, October 29. I’ll respond by Wednesday, November 11. Whether I read your poem or you read it yourself, I’d love to hear what you have to share.

One Poem Only Submissions Form

Wednesdays on One Poem Only are a double feature: one poem here on the podcast, and one more by the same poet shared on Instagram.

CyclesS. SalazarThe space in which my family occupies is a revolving door—each rotation moves me further from their timelines.Yet turning to push the door in reversewon’t take me back to a time with them:to picnics beneath the Central Park oaksor a game of tag among Puerto Rican palms.I existed decades after Abuelo exited the door.I stepped between the panes of glassjust as Abuela stepped out.Abuelo took everything with him except his family.Abuela held tight to her Latin roots,clutching memories of a childhood in Puerto Rico.Lugged them through her new life in Americauntil they calloused and cracked her hands.Stubborn, she carried that heritage out the door.Took customs and superstitions and stories.I’m left alone, spinning with the echo of her lifetimein empty air, the dust of her travels clustered on the floor.Pressing my palms against glass where her prints had been.Willing my prints to match hers. Praying I leave something morebehind despite having less. One day, I’ll step out.Everybody does. But I can’t leave until I fill this placewith something more than dust.

More from S. Salazar ↓

1. @writessalazar on Instagram
2. @writessalazar on Substack
3. Her book, Raíces, Relics, and Other Ghosts, published by Kelsay Books is available now

Watch the Second Poem

You can watch and listen to another poem by S. Salazar as part of our Wednesday double feature on Instagram at @rembrandts.cure.

Support + Stay Connected to OPO

If you’d like to support the show, Substack and Patreon members receive a copy of my book, For My Daughter, along with episodes from the audiobook.

Two poems. One poet. Let the words keep moving.

One Poem Only is a daily ritual: one poem, center stage, just for now.

Swan Dive by Maia von MaltzahnMaia von MaltzahnIt’s the kind of hotafternoon in Augustwhere the sun cracksyour mouth openso you can takea big gulp oflife
Chin tuckedwind-up lanky-limbsbare brownedshoulders humin the heatrunning warmwooden dockbeneath your feet, stepone, two, and
Leap…
gravitygreetsyou
like a pinky-promisein the lakewater answerswith a laughing splash
you elegant creaturehere, you belong.

More from Maia von Maltzahn ↓

1. @maiaelizabethwrites on Instagram

Support + Stay Connected to OPO

If you’d like to support the show, Substack and Patreon members receive a copy of my book, For My Daughter, along with episodes from the audiobook.

Feed yourself poetry every day.

Mentioned in this episode:

One Poem Only submissions are open.

This round, I’m looking for poems about what remains. What stays with us after we experience change? What survives? What do we yearn to carry forward? Send me the poem you wrote and want the world to hear. Also, if you’d like to read your own poem on the podcast, you can. Submit a clear audio file recorded in a quiet space—no perfect studio recording required. And yes, your poem can have been previously published in a literary magazine, a book, or on social media. Submissions close Thursday, October 29. I’ll respond by Wednesday, November 11. Whether I read your poem or you read it yourself, I’d love to hear what you have to share.

One Poem Only Submissions Form