Friends, we are awakening your Poetry Unbound feed for a moment to share this episode from the big, beautiful new season of On Being. And Pádraig’s here with a quick hello and a glimpse of what more On Being conversations await you in coming months. You won’t want to miss — subscribe now in the On Being feed and catch each episode as it drops, every Thursday. And now…

An electric conversation with Ada Limón's wisdom and her poetry — a refreshing, full-body experience of how this way with words and sound and silence teaches us about being human at all times, but especially now. With an unexpected and exuberant mix of gravity and laughter — laughter of delight, and of blessed relief — this conversation holds not only what we have traversed these last years, but how we live forward. 

It unfolded at the Ted Mann Concert Hall in Minneapolis, in collaboration with Northrop at the University of Minnesota and Ada Limón's publisher, Milkweed Editions.

Ada Limón is the 24th Poet Laureate of the United States. She’s written six books of poetry, most recently, The Hurting Kind. Her volume The Carrying won the National Book Critics Circle Award for Poetry, and her volume Bright Dead Things was a finalist for the National Book Award. She is a former host of the poetry podcast The Slowdown, and she teaches in the MFA program at Queens University of Charlotte, in North Carolina.

Find the transcript for this show at onbeing.org.

As part of a celebratory launch party for the new Poetry Unbound book, Pádraig welcomed Lorna Goodison, former Poet Laureate of Jamaica, into a joyful Zoom room of poetry lovers and listeners of the show, old and new. We draw Season 6 to a close with their conversation on themes explored in Lorna’s poem “Reporting Back to Queen Isabella” (one of the 50 featured in the book): poetry as a “made thing”; poetry as a form of travel.

And: Pádraig chats with our wonderful producer and composer Gautam Srikishan on the role of music in the show, with a warm hello from all the humans behind Poetry Unbound. Watch the full, unedited event here.

Lorna Goodison is one of the Caribbean's most distinguished contemporary poets. Her work appears in the Norton Anthology of World Masterpieces and her many honors include the Commonwealth Poetry Prize, Americas Region. She is the author of numerous books of poetry, including Supplying Salt and Light, Controlling the Silver, Traveling Mercies, and many more. Her work, translated into many languages, is widely published and anthologized.

Find Lorna Goodison’s poem in Poetry Unbound: 50 Poems to Open Your World, and in Season 3 of Poetry Unbound.

Thanks to everyone who joined us for Season 6 — we’ll be back with Season 7 later in 2023. In the meantime, continue your poetry ritual through our weekly Substack newsletter, with more musings and prompts from Pádraig and lively community of conversation in the comments.

Find the transcript for this show at onbeing.org.

A younger woman looks at an older woman, admiring her beauty, skill, and freedom. Older now, she thinks of how hard-won such freedom is. 

Also: singing opera while taking off your clothes. That too.

Danusha Laméris is a poet, teacher, and essayist. She is the author of The Moons of August (Autumn House, 2014), which was chosen by Naomi Shihab Nye as the winner of the Autumn House Press poetry prize, and was a finalist for the Milt Kessler Book Award. Her second book, Bonfire Opera (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2020), was a finalist for the Paterson Poetry Prize and winner of the Northern California Book Award in Poetry. The 2020 recipient of the Lucille Clifton Legacy Award, she is a Poet Laureate emeritus of Santa Cruz County, California.

Find the transcript for this show at onbeing.org.

We’re pleased to offer Danusha Laméris’ poem, and thank you for joining us for Season 6 of Poetry Unbound. We'll be back with Season 7 later in 2023.

Order your copy of Poetry Unbound: 50 Poems to Open Your World and join us in our vibrant conversational space on Substack.

Who brings you to praise? Rumi’s great poem of praise to the “you” is to his great friend Shams, and through that friendship, to God.

Rumi was a 13th-century Muslim mystic and poet. He left behind a vast body of lyric poetry, metaphysical writings, lectures, and letters, which have influenced Persian, Urdu, and Turkish literature across the centuries.

Haleh Liza Gafori is a translator, vocalist, poet, and educator of Persian descent born in New York City. She has sung and translated the poetry of various Persian poets for well over a decade. She is the translator of GOLD (New York Review of Books / NYRB Classics 2022), translations of poems by Rumi, the 13th-century Muslim mystic and poet. Gafori has taught classes at Dartmouth University, Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts, Taos Poetry Festival, and the Omega Institute.

Find the transcript for this show at onbeing.org.

We’re pleased to offer Rumi’s poem, and invite you to connect with Poetry Unbound throughout this season.

Order your copy of Poetry Unbound: 50 Poems to Open Your World and join us in our vibrant conversational space on Substack.

What’s it like to be owned by the world, to have populations claiming you, to have millions speaking on your behalf? Naomi Shihab Nye takes a close look — from a distance — at Jesus, and herself.

Naomi Shihab Nye is a professor of creative writing at Texas State University. From 2019-2021, Nye was the Young People's Poet Laureate through the Poetry Foundation. She is the author of You & Yours (BOA Editions 2005). Her more recent books include The Tiny Journalist (BOA Editions 2019), Voices in the Air: Poems for Listeners (Greenwillow Books 2022), Cast Away (HarperCollins 2020), and Everything Comes Next: Collected and New Poems (Greenwillow Books 2020). She received the 2019 Ivan Sandrof Lifetime Achievement Award from the National Book Critics Circle.

Find the transcript for this show at onbeing.org.

We’re pleased to offer Naomi Shihab Nye’s poem, and invite you to connect with Poetry Unbound throughout this season.

Order your copy of Poetry Unbound: 50 Poems to Open Your World and join us in our vibrant conversational space on Substack.

Quiet. Shhh. Softly. Don’t make a fuss. Don’t upset the authorities. Victoria Adukwei Bulley unquiets the quiet.

Victoria Adukwei Bulley is a poet, writer, and artist. She is the author of Quiet (Faber Books 2022; Knopf 2023), which was shortlisted for the 2022 T.S. Eliot Prize. Bulley is currently a doctoral student at the Royal Holloway, University of London.

Find the transcript for this show at onbeing.org.

We’re pleased to offer Victoria Adukwei Bulley’s poem, and invite you to connect with Poetry Unbound throughout this season.

Pre-order the forthcoming book Poetry Unbound: 50 Poems to Open Your World and join us in our new conversational space on Substack.

On the day you wake to a broken window in your car, what do you do? And what happens when the woman repairing that window offers a glimpse of something new?

Benjamín Naka-Hasebe Kingsley belongs to the Onondaga Nation of Indigenous Americans in New York. He is the author of Dēmos (Milkweed 2021), Colonize Me (Saturnalia 2019), and Not Your Mama’s Melting Pot (University of Nebraska Press 2018). Naka-Hasebe Kingsley is an assistant professor of English at Kalamazoo College. 

Find the transcript for this show at onbeing.org.

We’re pleased to offer Benjamín Naka-Hasebe Kingsley’s poem, and invite you to connect with Poetry Unbound throughout this season.

Pre-order the forthcoming book Poetry Unbound: 50 Poems to Open Your World and join us in our new conversational space on Substack.

When you move to a new place, everything seems different. Hell’s not hot anymore; it’s freezing. A poem of strangeness and wonder. 

Dan Vera is a writer, editor, watercolorist, and literary historian. Vera is the author of two books of poetry: Speaking Wiri Wiri (Red Hen Press 2013) and The Space Between Our Danger and Delight (Beothuk Books 2008). His honors include the Oscar Wilde Award for Poetry (2017) and the Letras Latinas/Red Hen Poetry Prize (2012). 

Find the transcript for this show at onbeing.org.

We’re pleased to offer Dan Vera’s poem, and invite you to connect with Poetry Unbound throughout this season.

Pre-order the forthcoming book Poetry Unbound: 50 Poems to Open Your World and join us in our new conversational space on Substack.

Who decides what’s self care and what isn’t? Who benefits? Who pays? Upon whom does the burden of self care rest? Solmaz Sharif excavates.

Solmaz Sharif is the author of Customs (Graywolf Press 2022) and Look (Graywolf Press 2016), and was a finalist for the National Book Award. She holds degrees from UC Berkeley, where she studied and taught with June Jordan’s Poetry for the People, and New York University. Her work has appeared in Harper’s, The Paris Review, Poetry, The Kenyon Review, the New York Times, and others. She is currently an Assistant Professor in Creative Writing at Arizona State University where she is inaugurating a Poetry for the People program.

Find the transcript for this show at onbeing.org.

We’re pleased to offer Solmaz Sharif’s poem, and invite you to connect with Poetry Unbound throughout this season.

Pre-order the forthcoming book Poetry Unbound: 50 Poems to Open Your World and join us in our new conversational space on Substack.

Some friendships are built on small encounters and last a lifetime. Two women — from across culture, location, and age — spend a lifetime in communication. 

Dunya Mikhail is an Iraqi-American poet and writer. She is the author of Diary of a Wave Outside the Sea (New Directions Publishing Corporation 2009), The Iraqi Nights (New Directions Publishing Corporation 2014), The Beekeeper (New Directions Publishing Corporation 2018), In Her Feminine Sign (New Directions Publishing Corporation 2019), and The Bird Tattoo (forthcoming from Pegasus Books 2022). She is a laureate of the UNESCO Sharja Prize for Arab Culture and has received fellowships from United States Artists, Guggenheim, and Kresge. Her honors also include the Arab American Book Award, and the UN Human Rights Award for Freedom of Writing. She currently works as a special lecturer of Arabic at Oakland University in Michigan.

Find the transcript for this show at onbeing.org.

We’re pleased to offer Dunya Mikhail’s poem, and invite you to connect with Poetry Unbound throughout this season.

Pre-order the forthcoming book Poetry Unbound: 50 Poems to Open Your World and join us in our new conversational space on Substack.