When I returned to face-to-face teaching in 2022, I centered class around the Poetry Unbound podcast, so students could learn how to love poetry and learn they already had everything they needed within them to understand poetry and literature.
Molly Twomey’s poem, and specifically the line, “Mostly I’m sorry I’m not as happy as you raised me to be,” like a bolt of lightning cracked my heart - my wounded-protected-disappointed-and scarred-tight heart - open, and unleashed a flood of compassion (sobbing, the good kind, all night), for my sister, and for my father who “told me to take your good umbrella... this is what you know to do,” for the whole family... for the suffering, the love, the everyone-is-doing-the-best-they-can, for the asking-for-help, for your discussion of who can help, who can’t really help.. for the whole of it. Where there was once a quick road to frustration and resentment, there is now this poem, and your beautiful and wise reading of it, building a new road in my heart-mind, that I can come back to, again and again, to reawaken my compassion. To say thank you isn’t enough 🙏🏾.
Poetry unbound in specific and Padraig's work in general has been a balm for ....cracking and sore skin for a while for me. The podcasts, lines and poems are like guests who join me at the right time and tell me truths i might feel hesitant to hear somedays. In "Prayers for a werewolf", the line "someone will love you for who you are, not just for who you labor to be" incited another question.....can that someone be me? Can i love me for who i am- not for who i labor to be ?
Phase One by Dilruba Ahmed changed me, forever. That poem, Padraig’s commentary about it, and the On Being episode with Pico Iyer in conversation with Liz Gilbert turned me into a person who now walks through her days loving herself. I mean to tell you right now: poems can change a person.
There are so many constantly surprising things that happen with poetry unbound, triggering memories, making connections, evoking deep emotions—-When I heard
“tomorrow they’ll wait for me
& I’ll reconstruct their home
anyone would do the same”
-from Laura Villareal’s “Even my worries have worries”, I found myself for a moment, unable to get out of my car to walk into work, transported back to a time of my youth when I was more scared than anyone knew, even more scared than I had allowed myself to remember, connected this to a another time of worry when my parents just sat with me and reminded me I had a home with them—-I even dictated the beginnings of a piece of writing on my walk into work, wanting to capture the connection that had just stopped me in my tracks.
One of my favorite parenting memories (and as a mother of five that says something) was a sunny but cool autumn day, when my nearly-grown daughter and I lay on our backs on a dock, covered with a makeshift blanket, heads together, eyes to the sky, and listened to you read Ode to Buttoning and UnButtoning My Shirt.
The gentle unfolding of each poem in the podcasts has a measurable effect on me. I feel safe, calm, sane in listening to the sonority of your voice, Padraig. I occasionally disagree with, or would add to, your analysis, but I always feel enriched by the poems and your reflections. It has made evident to me the inner defensive crouch with which I'm receiving life all too often. Warm, like burnished wood, are the brogue and the voice. Thank you for the light you cast on these marvelous poems.
There are too many poems that move me to comment on all of them, but Richard Blanco’s “Looking for the Gulf Motel” cracked me open at a time of grief for my parents, my brother, and an earlier time in my life. Caroline Bird’s “Little Children” made me laugh and laugh, and sigh and sigh.
In 2020, when the pandemic closed down the world, I walked 2 miles daily outdoors in my neighborhood. I listened to the Poetry Unbound podcast as I walked. I’d go through all the poems available and then start over again. Padraig’s voice, the poetry, and the brief discussions of each poem were a lifeline for my spirit. Most days, I continue to do this. Thank you for this blessing.
Poetry unbound has opened in me the idea that it's okay (and maybe necessary) to return to a poem or poet that I've previously read, and hear the voice in the poem anew, and that the voice I first hear when I first read a poem, may not be the only way that the poem can exist in me - that there are potentially many ways it can occupy my body and the space I inhabit.
Dear Pádraig: the selection of poems, your thoughtful commentary, and your warm and soothing voice kept me going during lockdown in 2020 and bring joy and hope to this day. Thank you.
I just stopped teaching after 20 years in which the reading and writing of poetry was often at the heart of my 7th grade classroom. Although a public school classroom is a complicated space, I always felt that there was the possibility of beauty, liberation, and unexpected magic in our shared world. Padriag's reading of What You Missed that Day You Were Absent from Fourth Grade by Brad Aaron Modlin was pure joy.
My husband woke up this morning to find me crying, having listeed again to one of the most heart wrenching and beautiful episodes, "Sestina" by Elzabeth Bishop.
Many years ago a friend invited me to a Galway Kinnell reading presented by the Laguna Poets. I had never been to a reading and hadn't heard of him. The art in this plain-looking and plain-speaking man's words mesmerized me,. And when he unveiled the transcendent image concluding "Daybreak," the audience gasped. I understood how poetry could make me feel.
Stephanie Burt's "Prayer for Werewolves" provided a metaphor, both poignant and faithful, for the mental illness that often engulfed my mother, and offered me a more expansive and generous way to understand and articulate our complicated relationship.
When I returned to face-to-face teaching in 2022, I centered class around the Poetry Unbound podcast, so students could learn how to love poetry and learn they already had everything they needed within them to understand poetry and literature.
Molly Twomey’s poem, and specifically the line, “Mostly I’m sorry I’m not as happy as you raised me to be,” like a bolt of lightning cracked my heart - my wounded-protected-disappointed-and scarred-tight heart - open, and unleashed a flood of compassion (sobbing, the good kind, all night), for my sister, and for my father who “told me to take your good umbrella... this is what you know to do,” for the whole family... for the suffering, the love, the everyone-is-doing-the-best-they-can, for the asking-for-help, for your discussion of who can help, who can’t really help.. for the whole of it. Where there was once a quick road to frustration and resentment, there is now this poem, and your beautiful and wise reading of it, building a new road in my heart-mind, that I can come back to, again and again, to reawaken my compassion. To say thank you isn’t enough 🙏🏾.
Poetry unbound in specific and Padraig's work in general has been a balm for ....cracking and sore skin for a while for me. The podcasts, lines and poems are like guests who join me at the right time and tell me truths i might feel hesitant to hear somedays. In "Prayers for a werewolf", the line "someone will love you for who you are, not just for who you labor to be" incited another question.....can that someone be me? Can i love me for who i am- not for who i labor to be ?
Phase One by Dilruba Ahmed changed me, forever. That poem, Padraig’s commentary about it, and the On Being episode with Pico Iyer in conversation with Liz Gilbert turned me into a person who now walks through her days loving herself. I mean to tell you right now: poems can change a person.
There are so many constantly surprising things that happen with poetry unbound, triggering memories, making connections, evoking deep emotions—-When I heard
“tomorrow they’ll wait for me
& I’ll reconstruct their home
anyone would do the same”
-from Laura Villareal’s “Even my worries have worries”, I found myself for a moment, unable to get out of my car to walk into work, transported back to a time of my youth when I was more scared than anyone knew, even more scared than I had allowed myself to remember, connected this to a another time of worry when my parents just sat with me and reminded me I had a home with them—-I even dictated the beginnings of a piece of writing on my walk into work, wanting to capture the connection that had just stopped me in my tracks.
One of my favorite parenting memories (and as a mother of five that says something) was a sunny but cool autumn day, when my nearly-grown daughter and I lay on our backs on a dock, covered with a makeshift blanket, heads together, eyes to the sky, and listened to you read Ode to Buttoning and UnButtoning My Shirt.
“Someone will probably love you for who you are.” This line went straight through me……
The gentle unfolding of each poem in the podcasts has a measurable effect on me. I feel safe, calm, sane in listening to the sonority of your voice, Padraig. I occasionally disagree with, or would add to, your analysis, but I always feel enriched by the poems and your reflections. It has made evident to me the inner defensive crouch with which I'm receiving life all too often. Warm, like burnished wood, are the brogue and the voice. Thank you for the light you cast on these marvelous poems.
There are too many poems that move me to comment on all of them, but Richard Blanco’s “Looking for the Gulf Motel” cracked me open at a time of grief for my parents, my brother, and an earlier time in my life. Caroline Bird’s “Little Children” made me laugh and laugh, and sigh and sigh.
In 2020, when the pandemic closed down the world, I walked 2 miles daily outdoors in my neighborhood. I listened to the Poetry Unbound podcast as I walked. I’d go through all the poems available and then start over again. Padraig’s voice, the poetry, and the brief discussions of each poem were a lifeline for my spirit. Most days, I continue to do this. Thank you for this blessing.
Poetry unbound has opened in me the idea that it's okay (and maybe necessary) to return to a poem or poet that I've previously read, and hear the voice in the poem anew, and that the voice I first hear when I first read a poem, may not be the only way that the poem can exist in me - that there are potentially many ways it can occupy my body and the space I inhabit.
Dear Pádraig: the selection of poems, your thoughtful commentary, and your warm and soothing voice kept me going during lockdown in 2020 and bring joy and hope to this day. Thank you.
I just stopped teaching after 20 years in which the reading and writing of poetry was often at the heart of my 7th grade classroom. Although a public school classroom is a complicated space, I always felt that there was the possibility of beauty, liberation, and unexpected magic in our shared world. Padriag's reading of What You Missed that Day You Were Absent from Fourth Grade by Brad Aaron Modlin was pure joy.
My husband woke up this morning to find me crying, having listeed again to one of the most heart wrenching and beautiful episodes, "Sestina" by Elzabeth Bishop.
Many years ago a friend invited me to a Galway Kinnell reading presented by the Laguna Poets. I had never been to a reading and hadn't heard of him. The art in this plain-looking and plain-speaking man's words mesmerized me,. And when he unveiled the transcendent image concluding "Daybreak," the audience gasped. I understood how poetry could make me feel.
Stephanie Burt's "Prayer for Werewolves" provided a metaphor, both poignant and faithful, for the mental illness that often engulfed my mother, and offered me a more expansive and generous way to understand and articulate our complicated relationship.