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Poetry Month: Editor's Picks

April is Poetry Month

Editor's whats? See how we choose the pieces that go on this list.

Check out our entire collection of Poetry Month radio here!

By Length:

> Hour Specials
> Half-Hour Specials
> Cutaways & Segments
> Insterstitials & Drop-ins

Hour+ Specials

Walt Whitman

Maya Angelou & Guy Johnson - Mother and Son Poets become themselves
Sedge Thomson, 44:45

Mother and son poets meet to talk about the courage of poetry, the pleasures of red rice and language.

"A must listen." - Sujan

Walt Whitman: Song of Myself
WNYC, 59:00

Exploring Whitman's groundbreaking work, "Leaves of Grass."

Life Distilled: Four Decades of U.S. Poet Laureates
New Letters on the Air, 59:00

This five-episode series of one-hour programs features 16 of the men and women who have served as United States Poet Laureates over the past four decades, from the late Howard Nemerov (1963-64) to Ted Kooser (2004-present).

The Poetry of Vietnam
Don McIver, 59:00

Take an audio tour through Vietnam using poetry in Vietnamese and English and inspired by what they called, "The American War."

Slam: Literary Fad or Movement
Don McIver, 59:00

In the '80s Marc Smith invented the Poetry Slam, which has swept the country and created a spoken word revolution.

El Beat Latino 007: Poems and all that Song and Dance
Catalina Maria Johnson, 58:59

From 16th century mystics to Pablo Neruda and Federico Garcia Lorca -- a danceable sampler of Latin American and Spanish poems.

Half-Hour Specials

What's the Word? Rhyme
Modern Language Association, 29:00: Rhyme in Arabic, English, and French poetry.
Virgil's Georgics: ThoughtCast interviews the poet and translator David Ferry
Jenny Attiyeh, 29:00: Virgil's Georgics: an interview with poet David Ferry, who recently translated Virgil's second great poem, The Georgics. We're joined by Virgil scholar Richard Thomas, the chair of Harvard's Classics Dept.
Ghada Kanafani, Palestinian Poet in Exile
Claudia Cragg, 20:00: Interview with Ghada Kanafani, a Palestinian poet born in Lebanon in 1948. The hardships and trauma of displacement prevented Kanafani from writing poetry for many years. Her new book, A Life in Pencil represents that re-emergence into creativity.
Poetry for Peace (Peace Talks Radio Series)
Good Radio Shows, Inc., 29:00: Poets from across the country offer up their words on the subject of "peace" at a special reading held at the 2005 National Poetry Slam Chapionships in Albuquerque, New Mexico.
Martin Espada
New Letters on the Air, 29:00: In this public poetry reading, Latino poet Martin Espada shares his engaging and rhythmic poetry from his collection "Alabanza: New and Selected Poems" (1982-2002). He also reads from "Imagine the Angels of Bread".
Rita Dove
New Letters on the Air, 29:00: Rita Dove discusses her poetry collections "American Smooth"--including the housefire that led her to ballroom dancing--and "Mother Love," which uses the myth of Persephone to show the love between mothers and daughters.
What's the Word? Poetry in Performance
Modern Language Association, 29:00: From Homer to slam, the special appeal of poetry in performance.
SERIES: RN Focus on Poetry
Radio Netherlands, 3 half-hour shows: Three documentaries for National Poetry Month: one in which Mark Twain looks at the authenticity of Shakespeare and two on the life and work of Walt Whitman.

Cutaways & Segments - 6:00-22:00

"If You See Something" by John Mulrooney
Sean Cole, 09:01: This is a poem by Boston area poet and Suffolk University professor John Mulrooney, recorded at the Boston Poetry Massacre on July 30, 2004.; "Makes poetry on the radio feel like a natural fit."
- Goldstein
Curim: e e cummings Fried in a Hard Drive
Echoes, 07:26: E.E. Cummings was a poet in word and form, sculpting his verse in graphic designs and synthesist. Evan Sorenstein has plugged into this. Under his recording guise as Curium he's made a beguiling recording, setting charming readings of Cummings poetry, read by a 3-year-old girl, an 80-something grandmother and everyone in between. Processed, stretched and distorted, he's set their words in a subtle ambient soundscape on the album Nowever.
Poetry Provides Peek Into Past
Francesca Rheannon, 06:07: Four women poets tell history through verse.
Mingling Pen and Plow
Salt, 07:42: Chinmney Farm in Nobleboro, Maine, has a rich literary history.; "This piece is poetry." - Astley
The Art of Spitting: a radio portrait of Slick Vic Low
Aaron Henkin, 08:00: Baltimore poet and MC Slick Vic Low reflects on his childhood and his longterm relationship with the microphone.
Poetry Combine
HearingVoices, 08:07: Street poets meet student poets in New Orleans.
What's the Word? Poet Michael S. Harper on the Poet's Art
Modern Language Association, 09:22: Michael S. Harper talks about what he teaches in his poetry classes and reads some his favorite poems.
The War of the Gods
Matthew Cowley, 12:13: Epic poem about the Ali-Frazier fight (The Thriller in Manila) by James Tokley.

Interstitials & Drop-Ins - Under 6:00

Louder Than a Bomb 2008
WBEZ, 24 drop-ins: For the fourth year, the station invited competition finalists in-studio from this nationally-renowned teen poetry slam, hosted by Young Chicago Authors.
11 Central Ave #27 - National Poetry Month
800 lb. Productions, 03:59: Nat recites a Wilfred Owen war poem.
Poetry Happens
02:04, Paul McDonald: Poetry is just as combustible and wild an art form as it always has been.
SERIES: Poem for Today
Gordon McDougall, Seven 4-minute shows: 4-minute poetry program.
SERIES: Jack Kerouac Disembodied School of Poetics
Naropa University, 15 drop-ins: Thirty years of poems from the Kerouac Summer Program.
SERIES: Claudia Schmidt - ROADS a spoken word collection
Bill Palladino, 12 drop-ins: A grouping of Poems read by Claudia Schmidt, each with improvised musical accompaniment.
SERIES: Poetry off the Shelf
Curtis Fox, 54 drop-ins: The Poetry Foundation presents contemporary poems read by actors.
SERIES: Jack Straw Poets
Jack Straw Productions, 10 drop-ins: Poets featured in the Jack Straw Writers Program.
Substitute Teaching (Poem)
Paul McDonald, 01:11: A poem about being a substitute teacher.
National Poetry Month Commentary
Brian Beatty, 01:24: A humorous look at the rhyming, if not cruelest, month.
A City Bigger Than
Warren Polk, 01:28: This is a social commentary/spoken word piece about the City of Chicago.
Trading One Tongue for the Other
outLoud Radio, 03:01: Young Filipino-American's poem on growing up in many languages.
What is Poetry?
HearingVoices, 03:35: Carl Sandburg reads poems and talks poetry, to the (original) music of Skyward.; "The end effect is almost Zen-like, like chanting a mantra over and over." - Nuzum
Five Poems
Patrick McLean, 03:51: Five poems for National Poetry month.
My Body My Temple
Dmae Roberts, 04:04: Women writers reading their own works about how breast cancer affects their body image.
Joyce Kilmer and Trees
Sarah Elzas, 04:27: A profile of Joyce Kilmer, author of Trees.
A Poem Lovely as a Tree
Sarah Elzas, 04:34: An exploration of Joyce Kilmer's most famous poem.; "Blossoming out with bright archival clips." - Van Halteren
Alex Caldiero- Poet?
HearingVoices, 04:41: Profile of Utah poet/performer Alex Caldiero.
The Poet and the Painter
Jackson Braider, 05:20: The story of how a poet inspired a painter to draw a picture about a poem that had, in turn, been inspired by a piece of the painter's work.
Martin Espada's "Alabanza"
Francesca Rheannon, 05:50: Poet Martin Espada reads poem and talks with program host, Francesca Rheannon.