Here's a small but juicy Emily Dickinson poem for you.

Why aren't there more poems about swimming? If you know of a good one, please let me know. 

This episode is for the long commutes or jumbo laundry piles!

Artist, poet, and friend Craig Goodworth joined me at my table to talk about art&theology, beauty, the joys&challenges of in-person poetry, reading The Odyssey to kids, and the fact that some days you see a deer and some days you don't. With lots in between. There are some good poems in this one!

I like that the mic picked up the clinking of ice in our glasses. We had fun chatting and sharing poems, and I hope you have a little fun listening. 

http://craiggoodworthart.squarespace.com/

When my friend and listener Kelly has time home alone she does wild things like sending poems to me. And I couldn't be happier. In this episode I pair her poem "To Molly" with Kay Ryan's poem "Masterworks of Ming". 

Kelly's musings on writing can be found at writing-life.blog

Stephen Dunn, again, because I had this poem stuck in my head when I returned from a trip in June. 

If you're going to spontaneously read a poem to a room full of people, Billy Collins is often a good choice.  And if the room full of people is about to disperse to travel in 23 directions "Passengers" makes an excellent selection. Thank you to my new friend Thomaida for demonstrating this in real life! 

After the death of a friend, it's the living ones who stagger around--dealing with plumbing problems, eating pie, and trying to make sense of it all. Here are two poems about that. 

"What the Living Do" by Marie Howe

"Ray" by Hayden Carruth 

Hayden Carruth reads "Ray"

For this week a sweet, red June poem: "Strawberrying"by May Swenson. I love this poem and marvel how Swenson captures the fleshy, violent abundance of nature with a tone of matter-of-factness and restraint. 

I pair a listener's poem "Broken Seashell" with Grace Shulman's "Because" and see what the two poems say together about the material world's brokenness and beauty. 

Kaitlin Wachter can be reached by email at [email protected] and you can find more of her poetry on Instagram @songsinthekeyofk

Some things, in love, can't be put into words.  In this episode, I share two poems written decades apart by Stephen Dunn that explore this concept.  

The power of Marie Howe's empathetic imagination flames out in this poem about a simple trip to the grocery store.