Open Windows Podcast

My program last week focused on the poet who, perhaps more than any other, used New England settings for his poems and who has become known as the quintessential New England poet. And that is Robert Frost. Frost presented us with visions of the natural landscape -- farms, hillsides, woods, the people who lived on and worked the land. New England surely is a place that is richly wooded and farmed. But New England is also a coastal region and its various poets write also about the sea. I think none do so more powerfully than Robert Lowell (1917-1977), and especially in his book Lord Weary's Castle. Other essential ocean poems by Lowell are in For the Union Dead and Near the Ocean. I read poems from those three books today.

My program last week presented poems about the pandemic and I hope you found them as powerful as I did. I mentioned, in that program, that I would be returning to my series of programs that have included poems by poets from various geographic regions of the country.  I return today to New England and I focus on the poet who, perhaps more than any other, used New England settings for his poems and who has become known as the quintessential New England poet. And that is Robert Frost.  

My program today considers the idea that writers try to make sense of things that often make no sense, that they try to give shape and articulate our need to understand what we see and live through as individuals and as members of communities. It is the calling of the writer to provide lessons about the human community, to teach us while delighting us, even if those lessons and delights are couched in metaphor and symbol or if they are stated directly and clearly in lyrical and narrative texts. Many writers from across the world are writing down what they see and hear and consider in this difficult time we are all living through. I read poems today written in response to this terrible pandemic, this distress that has caused so much heartache for so many, across the country and throughout the world. More such poems can be found at https://www.tejascovido.com/  TEJASCOVIDO is a splendid and timely online literary journal edited by Laurence Musgrove and published at Angelo State University in San Angelo, Texas. I read poems by Ken Hada, Katherine Hoerth, Julie Chappell, Loretta Diane Walker, Jerry Bradley, Jerry Craven, Steven Schroeder, and Jamie Stern.

My program today is the twelfth in a series of programs that present poems written by poets living in various geographic regions of the country. Today's program is the second program that presents poets from Connecticut. I read poems by Kate Rushin, Edwina Trentham, J.D. "Sandy" McClatchy, Rennie McQuilken, and David K. Leff. I end the program with one of my own poems.

My program today is the eleventh in a series of programs that present poems written by poets living in various geographic regions of the country. Today's program is the first of two programs that present poets from Connecticut. I read poems by Vivian Shipley, Steven Campiglio, V. Penelope Pelizzon, Eddie Morales, Emily Creighton, and Giovanna Gatto.

My program today is the tenth in a series of programs that present poems written by poets living in various geographic regions of the country. Today's program is the fourth program focusing on New York. I read poems by Marie Ponsot, Jamie Stern, Audre Lord, and Sandra Maria Esteves.

My program today is the ninth in a series of programs that present poems written by poets living in various geographic regions of the country. Today's program is the third program focusing on New York. I read poems by poets who are part of the New York School of poetry, whose home was Manhattan: Frank O'Hara, Barbara Guest, Kenneth Koch, Bill Zavatsky, and Bernadette Mayer.

My program today is the eighth in a series of programs that present poems written by poets living in various geographic regions of the country. Today's program is the second program focusing on New York. I read poems by poets who lived or wrote in Brooklyn: Walt Whitman, Hart Crane, June Jordan, Vyt Bakaitis, and Suheir Hammad.

I’m delighted to offer Episode 58 of Open Windows. My program today is the seventh in a series of programs that present poems written by poets living in various geographic regions of the country. My six earlier programs in this series included poets from the Southwest, the South more broadly, the Midwest, the Mountain Region of the West, the Pacific Region, and from two of the Mid-Atlantic states, New Jersey and Pennsylvania. Today's program is the first of two programs focusing on New York, which is the third Mid-Atlantic state. I read poems by poets from what is known as Upstate New York: Mary Panza, Edna St. Vincent Millay, Anthony Hecht, Carl Dennis, and Robert Creeley.

My program today is the sixth in a series of programs that present poems written by poets living in various geographic regions of the country. My five earlier programs in this series included poets from the Southwest, the South more broadly, the Midwest, the Mountain Region of the West, and the Pacific Region. Today I read poems by poets from that part of the Northeast known as the Mid-Atlantic states, principally New Jersey and Pennsylvania.  I will read poems from the third Mid-Atlantic state, New York, in my next program. Poets today are Peter Balakian, Joyce Kilmer, Alicia Ostriker, Patti Smith, Craig Czury, Kerry Shawn Keys, and Patricia Goodrich.