Poetry, promiscuity, philosophy: maybe you should ask your next question!

Thom Gunn was born on August 29, 1929 and died on April 25, 2004. He was born in Gravesend, England to parents who were both journalists. 

Jorie Graham (born May 9, 1950—Taurus) won the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry in 1996 for The Dream of the Unified Field: Selected Poems 1974-1994. Since 1999, she has been Boylston Professor of Oratory and Rhetoric at Harvard—and she is the first woman to hold the Boylston professorship. She has received many honors and awards for her work. Her newest book is Runaway (Ecco/HarperCollins, 2020). Watch Graham read "Studies in Secrecy" at the 2006 Dodge Poetry Festival here (under 5 min).

 Jesus was born….just kidding!

We mention Jorie Graham's poem "Praying  (Attempt of 6 June ’03)" – the one in which the speaker adopts a cat with feline HIV. It was first published in the London Review of Books in January, 2005, and later included in her book Overlord. You can read that poem here. 

Graham's poem "Evolution" first appeared in The New York Times Magazine and can be read here. 

 The cathedral mentioned in Jorie Graham's poem is St Patrick's Cathedral Armagh in Ireland.

Watch Thom Gunn reading at the Berkeley Art Center here (~25 min)

The article Aaron references regarding Thom Gunn (aka "promiscuous poet") can be read here. 

The How to Be Amazing podcast interview with Tim Gunn can be found here. 

Watch Thom Gunn reading at the Berkeley Art Center here (~25 min)

You can read "A Feather for Voltaire" from Hybrids of Plantas and of Ghosts here. 

You can hear Allen Ginsberg read "Please Master" here (~5 min)