SLEERICKETS

By Matthew Buckley SmithArts Books

SLEERICKETS episodes

April 08, 2025 Ep 190: One-Peacoat Poetics
NB: For those who are interested/concerned, I ended up deciding against the influential-editor-publication strategy discussed in the intro. Slightly long story, but in the end I just didn’t have the stomach for it. And don’t you start lecturing me about Chubby Checker. He did The Twist. The Beatles did Twist and Shout. So there.
SLEERICKETS is a podcast about poetry and other intractable problems.
My book Midlife now exists. Buy it here, or leave it a rating here or here
For more SLEERICKETS, check out the SECRET SHOW and join the group chat
Leave the show a rating here (actually, just do it on your phone, it’s easier). Thanks!
Wear SLEERICKETS t-shirts and hoodies. They look good!
SLEERICKETS is now on YouTube!
Some of the topics mentioned in this episode:
– Literary Matters
– Before the Bath by Ismail Kadare (Albanian, not Turkish!)
– The University of St. Thomas in Houston
– New Verse Review
– Paradise Lost by John Milton
– Red Scare
– Grok
– Chubby Checker by M. I. Devine
– Regarding your workplace matter by Belinda Rule
– Human Math by Tin Fogdall
Frequently mentioned names:
– Joshua Mehigan
– Shane McCrae
– A. E. Stallings
– Ryan Wilson
– Morri Creech
– Austin Allen
– Jonathan Farmer
– Zara Raab
– Amit Majmudar
– Ethan McGuire
– Coleman Glenn
– Chris Childers
– Alexis Sears
– JP Gritton
– Alex Pepple
– Ernie Hilbert
– Joanna Pearson
Other Ratbag Poetry Pods:
Poetry Says by Alice Allan
I Hate Matt Wall by Matt Wall
Versecraft by Elijah Blumov
Ratbag Poetics By David Jalal Motamed
Alice: Poetry Says
Brian: @BPlatzer
Cameron: CameronWTC [at] hotmail [dot] com
Matthew: sleerickets [at] gmail [dot] com
Music by ETRNL
Art by Daniel Alexander Smith
1 hr 20 min
April 02, 2025 Ep 189: The Walcott Scandal, ft. Jonathan Farmer, Pt. 1
SLEERICKETS is a podcast about poetry and other intractable problems.
My book Midlife now exists. Buy it here, or leave it a rating here or here
For more SLEERICKETS, check out the SECRET SHOW and join the group chat
Leave the show a rating here (actually, just do it on your phone, it’s easier). Thanks!
Wear SLEERICKETS t-shirts and hoodies. They look good!
SLEERICKETS is now on YouTube!
Some of the topics mentioned in this episode:
Derek Walcott
Ruins of a Great House by Derek Walcott
Disjecta membra
Ep 173: Swart Verse, ft. A. E. Stallings, Pt. 1
The Islander by Hilton Als
Walcott Withdraws From Poetry Professor Election by Sarah Lyall
Poetic Justice: Briton Says She Helped Taint Rival by John F. Burns
Derek Walcott, a Mighty Poet, Has Died by Hilton Als
Hilton Als: "I had this terrible need to confess, and I still do it. It’s a bid to be loved" by Emma Brockes
We Might Have to "Shut Down the Country" by David Remnick
The Gifts of John Forbes by Kath Kenny
In Memory of W. B. Yeats by W. H. Auden
Alice Munro’s Retreat by Anne Enright
André Malraux
Causeway (2022)
Frequently mentioned names:
– Joshua Mehigan
– Shane McCrae
– A. E. Stallings
– Ryan Wilson
– Morri Creech
– Austin Allen
– Jonathan Farmer
– Zara Raab
– Amit Majmudar
– Ethan McGuire
– Coleman Glenn
– Chris Childers
– Alexis Sears
– JP Gritton
– Alex Pepple
– Ernie Hilbert
– Joanna Pearson
Other Ratbag Poetry Pods:
Poetry Says by Alice Allan
I Hate Matt Wall by Matt Wall
Versecraft by Elijah Blumov
Ratbag Poetics By David Jalal Motamed
Alice: Poetry Says
Brian: @BPlatzer
Cameron: CameronWTC [at] hotmail [dot] com
Matthew: sleerickets [at] gmail [dot] com
Music by ETRNL
Art by Daniel Alexander Smith
59 min
March 27, 2025 Ep 188: Counseling Out, Pt. 1
SLEERICKETS is a podcast about poetry and other intractable problems.
My book Midlife now exists. Buy it here, or leave it a rating here or here
For more SLEERICKETS, check out the SECRET SHOW and join the group chat
Leave the show a rating here (actually, just do it on your phone, it’s easier). Thanks!
Wear SLEERICKETS t-shirts and hoodies. They look good!
SLEERICKETS is now on YouTube!
Some of the topics mentioned in this episode:
Teachers Who Tutor
An Elite School, a Boy’s Suicide and a Question of Blame by John Leland
The Shame of Saint Ann’s by Caitlin Moscatello and James Walsh
Bottoms (2023)
Adrienne Rich
Frequently mentioned names:
– Joshua Mehigan
– Shane McCrae
– A. E. Stallings
– Ryan Wilson
– Morri Creech
– Austin Allen
– Jonathan Farmer
– Zara Raab
– Amit Majmudar
– Ethan McGuire
– Coleman Glenn
– Chris Childers
– Alexis Sears
– JP Gritton
– Alex Pepple
– Ernie Hilbert
– Joanna Pearson
Other Ratbag Poetry Pods:
Poetry Says by Alice Allan
I Hate Matt Wall by Matt Wall
Versecraft by Elijah Blumov
Ratbag Poetics By David Jalal Motamed
Alice: Poetry Says
B
Cameron: CameronWTC [at] hotmail [dot] com
Matthew: sleerickets [at] gmail [dot] com
Music by ETRNL
Art by Daniel Alexander Smith
1 hr 6 min
March 22, 2025 Ep 187: This Was Poetry, ft. Versecraft, Pt. 1
SLEERICKETS is a podcast about poetry and other intractable problems.
NB: Oops, guess it was more than ten years.
My book Midlife now exists. Buy it here, or leave it a rating here or here
For more SLEERICKETS, check out the SECRET SHOW and join the group chat
Leave the show a rating here (actually, just do it on your phone, it’s easier). Thanks!
Wear SLEERICKETS t-shirts and hoodies. They look good!
SLEERICKETS is now on YouTube!
Some of the topics mentioned in this episode:
– The last episode of Poetry Says
– The Paradise Lost episode of Poetry Says, Pt. 1 & Pt. 2
– The Iron Lyre by Elijah Blumov
– The New Versecraft Substack
– The Iron Lyre Playlist on YouTube and Spotify
– Why So Serious? by Alex Ross
– Aunt Imogen by E. A. Robinson
– Brian Brodeur’s piece on E. A. Robinson
– When I Mean I by Jonathan Farmer
– The episode with Alan Shapiro
– The episode with Naomi Kanakia
– The manifesto episode
– A Dress Rehearsal for the Truth by Alan Shapiro
– The Futurist Manifesto
– American History X (1998)
Frequently mentioned names:
– Joshua Mehigan
– Shane McCrae
– A. E. Stallings
– Ryan Wilson
– Morri Creech
– Austin Allen
– Jonathan Farmer
– Zara Raab
– Matt Wall
– Amit Majmudar
– Ethan McGuire
– Coleman Glenn
– Chris Childers
– Alexis Sears
– JP Gritton
– Alex Pepple
– Ernie Hilbert
– Joanna Pearson
Other Ratbag Poetry Pods:
Poetry Says by Alice Allan
I Hate Matt Wall by Matt Wall
Versecraft by Elijah Blumov
Ratbag Poetics By David Jalal Motamed
Alice: Poetry Says
Brian: @BPlatzer
Cameron: CameronWTC [at] hotmail [dot] com
Matthew: sleerickets [at] gmail [dot] com
Music by ETRNL
Art by Daniel Alexander Smith
1 hr 9 min
March 16, 2025 Ep 186: A QWERTYUIOP of the Mind
SLEERICKETS is a podcast about poetry and other intractable problems.
NB: Jonathan helpfully pointed out that Lincoln was (obviously) re-elected in 1864. In my defense, Google was very easily convinced that it was 1863 and readily supplied me with a date in November of that year.
My book Midlife now exists. Buy it here, or leave it a rating here or here
For more SLEERICKETS, check out the SECRET SHOW and join the group chat
Leave the show a rating here (actually, just do it on your phone, it’s easier). Thanks!
Wear SLEERICKETS t-shirts and hoodies. They look good!
SLEERICKETS is now on YouTube!
Some of the topics mentioned in this episode:
– When I Mean I by Jonathan Farmer
– Locating Voice by Christopher Childers
– Too Horny for Hexameter: Ovid’s Epic Fail by Christopher Childers
– My essay on Joshua Beckman
– The Polyvocal Poet by Ryan Wilson
– What Voice Is, ft. Jonathan Farmer, Pt. 1 & Pt. 2
– Horace i.25
– Horace ii.20
– The Whirligig of Time by Anthony Hecht
– Heart of Autumn by Robert Penn Warren
– Western Wind
– Whoso List to Hunt by Thomas Wyatt
– Ozymandias by Percy Byshe Shelley
– Horace iii.2
– The Declaration of Independence by Thomas Jefferson
– The Gettysburg Address by Abraham Lincoln
Frequently mentioned names:
– Joshua Mehigan
– Shane McCrae
– A. E. Stallings
– Ryan Wilson
– Morri Creech
– Austin Allen
– Jonathan Farmer
– Zara Raab
– Matt Wall
– Amit Majmudar
– Ethan McGuire
– Coleman Glenn
– Chris Childers
– Alexis Sears
– JP Gritton
– Alex Pepple
– Ernie Hilbert
– Joanna Pearson
Other Ratbag Poetry Pods:
Poetry Says by Alice Allan
I Hate Matt Wall by Matt Wall
Versecraft by Elijah Blumov
Ratbag Poetics By David Jalal Motamed
Alice: Poetry Says
Brian: @BPlatzer
Cameron: CameronWTC [at] hotmail [dot] com
Matthew: sleerickets [at] gmail [dot] com
Music by ETRNL
Art by Daniel Alexander Smith
1 hr 33 min
March 08, 2025 Ep 185: Don’t Drown, ft. Naomi Kanakia, Pt. 1
SLEERICKETS is a podcast about poetry and other intractable problems.
My book Midlife now exists. Buy it here, or leave it a rating here or here
For more SLEERICKETS, check out the SECRET SHOW and join the group chat
Leave the show a rating here (actually, just do it on your phone, it’s easier). Thanks!
Wear SLEERICKETS t-shirts and hoodies. They look good!
SLEERICKETS is now on YouTube!
Some of the topics mentioned in this episode:
– Woman of Letters by Naomi Kanakia
– Is literary criticism just a school of sophistry? by Naomi Kanakia
– English class teaches students to be afraid of literature by Naomi Kanakia
– Is literature a false God? by Naomi Kanakia
– The new issue of Literary Matters!
– My poem Letter to a Middle-Aged Poet in First Things
– The Versecraft episode where we all traded poems, Pt. 1 & Pt. 2
– AWP 2025
– What is art? by Leo Tolstoy
– The Secret Show episode on What is art?, Pt. 1 & Pt. 2
– The Unbearable Lightness of Being by Milan Kundera
– Crisis of European Sciences and Transcendental Phenomenology by Edmund Husserl
– Naomi’s review of James by Percival Everett in The Metropolitan Review
– Moby Dick by Herman Melville
– Against Interpretation by Susan Sontag
– The Case of the Wolf Man from the History of Infantile Neurosis by Sigmund Freud
– Mary Jo Salter
– The Norton Anthology of Poetry
– The Poem’s Heartbeat by Alfred Corn
– The Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer
– On Close Reading by John Guillory
Frequently mentioned names:
– Joshua Mehigan
– Shane McCrae
– A. E. Stallings
– Ryan Wilson
– Morri Creech
– Austin Allen
– Jonathan Farmer
– Zara Raab
– Amit Majmudar
– Ethan McGuire
– Coleman Glenn
– Chris Childers
– Alexis Sears
– JP Gritton
– Alex Pepple
– Ernie Hilbert
– Joanna Pearson
Other Ratbag Poetry Pods:
Poetry Says by Alice Allan
I Hate Matt Wall by Matt Wall
Versecraft by Elijah Blumov
Ratbag Poetics By David Jalal Motamed
Alice: Poetry Says
Brian: @BPlatzer
Cameron: CameronWTC [at] hotmail [dot] com
Matthew: sleerickets [at] gmail [dot] com
Music by ETRNL
Art by Daniel Alexander Smith
52 min
February 25, 2025 Ep 184: Chaos Reigns, Pt. 1
NB: Sign up for Alexis Sears’s 92NY online poetry class now—deadline Wednesday, Feb 26!
SLEERICKETS is a podcast about poetry and other intractable problems.
My book Midlife now exists. Buy it here, or leave it a rating here or here
For more SLEERICKETS, check out the SECRET SHOW and join the group chat
Leave the show a rating here (actually, just do it on your phone, it’s easier). Thanks!
Wear SLEERICKETS t-shirts and hoodies. They look good!
SLEERICKETS is now on YouTube!
Some of the topics mentioned in this episode:
– Sign up for Alexis Sears’s 92NY online poetry class now—deadline Wednesday, Feb 26!
– The Shape that Am I by Patricia Lockwood
– COINTELPRO: The FBI’s Secret War on Political Freedom by Nelson Blackstock
– Dan Deacon
– Antichrist (2009)
– Immersion (Piss Christ) by Andres Serrano
– The Motte-and-Bailey Fallacy
– The Varieties of Religious Experience by William James
– The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins
Frequently mentioned names:
– Joshua Mehigan
– Shane McCrae
– A. E. Stallings
– Ryan Wilson
– Morri Creech
– Austin Allen
– Jonathan Farmer
– Zara Raab
– Amit Majmudar
– Ethan McGuire
– Coleman Glenn
– Chris Childers
– Alexis Sears
– JP Gritton
– Alex Pepple
– Ernie Hilbert
– Joanna Pearson
Other Ratbag Poetry Pods:
Poetry Says by Alice Allan
I Hate Matt Wall by Matt Wall
Versecraft by Elijah Blumov
Ratbag Poetics By David Jalal Motamed
Alice: Poetry Says
Brian: @BPlatzer
Cameron: CameronWTC [at] hotmail [dot] com
Matthew: sleerickets [at] gmail [dot] com
Music by ETRNL
Art by Daniel Alexander Smith
1 hr 2 min
February 21, 2025 Ep 183: The Icy Élysée, ft. Alan Shapiro, Pt.1
NB: Alan’s most recent poetry collection is, in fact, By and By, from Waywiser Press
SLEERICKETS is a podcast about poetry and other intractable problems.
My book Midlife now exists. Buy it here, or leave it a rating here or here
For more SLEERICKETS, check out the SECRET SHOW and join the group chat
Leave the show a rating here (actually, just do it on your phone, it’s easier). Thanks!
Wear SLEERICKETS t-shirts and hoodies. They look good!
SLEERICKETS is now on YouTube!
Some of the topics mentioned in this episode:
– A Dress Rehearsal for the Truth by Alan Shapiro
– By and By by Alan Shapiro
– Proceed to Check Out by Alan Shapiro
– An Arrangement by Alan Shapiro
– The Season of Phantasmal Peace by Derek Walcott
– Hooks by C. K. Williams
– Donahue’s Sister by Thom Gunn
– Ep 169: Thunder & Rain
– On Convention by Alan Shapiro
– The Hill We Climb by Amanda Gorman
– One Today by Richard Blanco
– Praise Song for the Day by Elizabeth Alexander
– Axel’s Castle: A Study in the Imaginative Literature of 1870-1930 by Edmund Wilson
– Notes of a Native Son by James Baldwin
– This Is Just to Say by William Carlos Williams
– Fountain by Marcel Duchamp
– Of Heaven Considered as a Tomb by Wallace Stevens
– Unbound Edition Press
– Peter Campion
– Waywiser Press (Soon to become Waywiser Books?)
– Joseph Harrison
– Dora Malech
– Philip Hoy
– The Gabbro Head Press
– James Longenbach
Frequently mentioned names:
– Joshua Mehigan
– Shane McCrae
– A. E. Stallings
– Ryan Wilson
– Morri Creech
– Austin Allen
– Jonathan Farmer
– Zara Raab
– Amit Majmudar
– Ethan McGuire
– Coleman Glenn
– Chris Childers
– Alexis Sears
– JP Gritton
– Alex Pepple
– Ernie Hilbert
– Joanna Pearson
Other Ratbag Poetry Pods:
Poetry Says by Alice Allan
I Hate Matt Wall by Matt Wall
Versecraft by Elijah Blumov
Ratbag Poetics By David Jalal Motamed
Alice: Poetry Says
Brian: @BPlatzer
Cameron: CameronWTC [at] hotmail [dot] com
Matthew: sleerickets [at] gmail [dot] com
Music by ETRNL
Art by Daniel Alexander Smith
57 min
February 14, 2025 Ep 182: Cherchez la femme
SLEERICKETS is a podcast about poetry and other intractable problems.
My book Midlife now exists. Buy it here, or leave it a rating here or here
For more SLEERICKETS, check out the SECRET SHOW and join the group chat
Leave the show a rating here (actually, just do it on your phone, it’s easier). Thanks!
Wear SLEERICKETS t-shirts and hoodies. They look good!
SLEERICKETS is now on YouTube!
Some of the topics mentioned in this episode:
– Even My Sex Is Dust (Review of The Penguin Anthology of Spiritual Verse, ed. Kaveh Akbar) by Zara Raab
– Ep 177: Alice & Elijah vs. the Abyss, ft. Versecraft Pt. 1 & Pt. 2
– Churchgoing by Marilyn Nelson
– Church Going by Philip Larkin
– Were You There (traditional)
– Address to the Atheist by Phyllis Wheatley
– On Being Brought from Africa to America by Phyllis Wheatley
– Accepting the Disaster by Joshua Mehigan (poem)
– The Fall of Rome by W. H. Auden
– Aubade by Philip Larkin
– Why I am now a Christian by Ayaan Hirsi Ali
– Why I am not a Christian by Bertrand Russell
– Ross Douthat
– Jonathan Rauch
– Ep 64: The Rabbit Hole, Pt. 1 & Pt. 2
– Luxury beliefs are the latest status symbol for rich Americans by Rob Henderson
– The Daily’s interview with Curtis Yarvin
– Poetry Says Ep 186. Sensitive New Right Guy
– Poetry Says Ep 294. The American Ecstatic
– Tar River Poetry
– What is art? by Leo Tolstoy
– The Dark Mountain Manifesto
Frequently mentioned names:
– Joshua Mehigan
– Shane McCrae
– A. E. Stallings
– Ryan Wilson
– Morri Creech
– Austin Allen
– Jonathan Farmer
– Zara Raab
– Amit Majmudar
– Ethan McGuire
– Coleman Glenn
– Chris Childers
– Alexis Sears
– JP Gritton
– Alex Pepple
– Ernie Hilbert
– Joanna Pearson
Other Ratbag Poetry Pods:
Poetry Says by Alice Allan
I Hate Matt Wall by Matt Wall
Versecraft by Elijah Blumov
Ratbag Poetics By David Jalal Motamed
Alice: Poetry Says
Brian: @BPlatzer
Cameron: CameronWTC [at] hotmail [dot] com
Matthew: sleerickets [at] gmail [dot] com
Music by ETRNL
Art by Daniel Alexander Smith
1 hr 21 min
February 06, 2025 Ep 181: Against Sticks-&-Stones-ism
NB: Brian informs me that Yarvin’s interviewer was actually David Marchese, not Michael Barbaro, which might explain why I found him so much less insufferable than usual! Also, male mainstream liberal podcasters sure do all have the same voice, don’t they?
SLEERICKETS is a podcast about poetry and other intractable problems.
My book Midlife now exists. Buy it here, or leave it a rating here or here
For more SLEERICKETS, check out the SECRET SHOW and join the group chat
Leave the show a rating here (actually, just do it on your phone, it’s easier). Thanks!
Wear SLEERICKETS t-shirts and hoodies. They look good!
SLEERICKETS is now on YouTube!
Some of the topics mentioned in this episode:
– The Daily’s interview with Curtis Yarvin
– Yarvin’s embarrassing thoughts on the Passage Prize
– Yarvin’s less less embarrassing thoughts on a Poetry Daily poem
– Alice’s two poems in New Verse Review
– Violent Femmes by Nida Sophasarun
– My short essay on the 32 Poems website
– My poem Melancholia in Ploughshares (just ask if you want to read it)
– Poetry Says Ep 186. Sensitive New Right Guy
– Poetry Says Ep 294. The American Ecstatic
– Sex Elegy by Terence Winch
– Tar River Poetry
– Nik Prassas’ transcriptions of Geoffrey Hill’s lectures
– Ep 49: Handsome People Can Be Sad, ft. David Kern
– What is art? by Leo Tolstoy
Frequently mentioned names:
– Joshua Mehigan
– Shane McCrae
– A. E. Stallings
– Ryan Wilson
– Morri Creech
– Austin Allen
– Jonathan Farmer
– Zara Raab
– Amit Majmudar
– Ethan McGuire
– Coleman Glenn
– Chris Childers
– Alexis Sears
– JP Gritton
– Alex Pepple
– Ernie Hilbert
– Joanna Pearson
Other Ratbag Poetry Pods:
Poetry Says by Alice Allan
I Hate Matt Wall by Matt Wall
Versecraft by Elijah Blumov
Ratbag Poetics By David Jalal Motamed
Alice: Poetry Says
Brian: @BPlatzer
Cameron: CameronWTC [at] hotmail [dot] com
Matthew: sleerickets [at] gmail [dot] com
Music by ETRNL
Art by Daniel Alexander Smith
1 hr 2 min