Claim OwnershipThe Slowdown: Poetry & Reflection Daily
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Poet Major Jackson is your guide on the pathways to feel and understand our common journey – through poetry. In sharing poems, we take a moment to pause and acknowledge the world’s magnitude, and how poets illuminate that mystery. Join The Slowdown for a poem and a moment of reflection in one short episode, every weekday. Produced by APM Studios in partnership with The Poetry Foundation and supported in part by the National Endowment for the Arts.
The Slowdown is your daily poetry ritual. Make us a part of your routine as you drink coffee in the morning, as you take a walk in nature, or as you wind down to go to sleep in the evening. With host Major Jackson, we collectively take a moment to calm, to inspire, to learn, and to engage with the best emerging poets and established writers of our time and generations past, from Emily Dickinson to Danez Smith, from Amanda Gorman to Mary Oliver.
Listen to our back catalog for episodes by our previous hosts, Tracy K. Smith and Ada Limón, as well as guest hosts Jenny Xie, Brenda Shaughnessy, Tina Chang, Nate Marshall, Shira Erlichiman, and Jason Schneiderman. Our hosts and production team select poems that move them, and we hope they move you, too.
413 Episodes
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Today’s poem is Shadow Play by Jessica Fisher. The Slowdown is your daily poetry ritual. In this episode, guest host Myka Kielbon writes… “Today’s poem speaks to someone who left marks on this earth hundreds of years ago. It asks what elemental — and metaphysical — forces moved through them, like wind playing the chimes. Just like those forces did then, and do today, and will tomorrow.” Celebrate the power of poems with a gift to The Slowdown today. Every donation makes a difference: https://tinyurl.com/rjm4synp
Today’s poem is Letter to a Young Poet by Megan Fernandes. The Slowdown is your daily poetry ritual. In this episode, guest host Myka Kielbon writes… “Today’s poem holds its epiphanies close. It lives in that space which grows from wholehearted obsession, specificity, and the knowledge that the act of returning is the kind of love that keeps us going.” Celebrate the power of poems with a gift to The Slowdown today. Every donation makes a difference: https://tinyurl.com/rjm4synp
Today’s poem is On Being by Ruben Quesada. The Slowdown is your daily poetry ritual. In this episode, Major writes… “Today’s poem captures our complex relationship with nature, how we experience the sublime of the seasons, but also, the way it is often mediated through our modern and mechanized era.” Celebrate the power of poems with a gift to The Slowdown today. Every donation makes a difference: https://tinyurl.com/rjm4synp
Today’s poem is Mami Told Me to Put Water under the Bed by Peggy Robles-Alvarado. The Slowdown is your daily poetry ritual. In this episode, Major writes… “Today’s poem professes the healing properties of water and the restorative powers of language to renew our connection to each other.” Celebrate the power of poems with a gift to The Slowdown today. Every donation makes a difference: https://tinyurl.com/rjm4synp
Today’s poem is Trans Loneliness by Rickey Laurentiis. The Slowdown is your daily poetry ritual. In this episode, Major writes… “Society’s debates around gender identity boils down to this simple fact: people want others to see them as they see themselves. This is a pure, human need for affirmation from friends, parents, and peers. It builds self-esteem and mental stability.” Celebrate the power of poems with a gift to The Slowdown today. Every donation makes a difference: https://tinyurl.com/rjm4synp
Today’s poem is A House Called Tomorrow by Alberto Ríos. The Slowdown is your daily poetry ritual. In this episode, Major writes… “I loved watching the volunteers at my polling place. They were cheerful. They lovingly bantered, though they certainly could have belonged to different political parties. They gave me a vision of selfless coexistence that felt like this defined us more than our public debates. I thought of legions of people who volunteer to combat all manner of challenges to society, no matter their political affiliation.” Celebrate the power of poems with a gift to The Slowdown today. Every donation makes a difference: https://tinyurl.com/rjm4synp
Today’s poem is Gala Noise by Diane Mehta. The Slowdown is your daily poetry ritual. In this episode, Major writes… “Today’s poem invites us to contemplate how language is not just what is heard, but what is conveyed beneath the surface. Underneath, it sees that we are interconnected with nature, linked to an existential restlessness which leads us to the act of making sounds.” Celebrate the power of poems with a gift to The Slowdown today. Every donation makes a difference: https://tinyurl.com/rjm4synp
Today’s poem is Second Paradise by Chard deNiord. The Slowdown is your daily poetry ritual. In this episode, Major writes… “Today’s shrewd poem ardently shows how time shreds memories into a dreamlike sequence of events, yet we are preserved in our stories.” Celebrate the power of poems with a gift to The Slowdown today. Every donation makes a difference: https://tinyurl.com/rjm4synp
Today’s poem is Refugia by Traci Brimhall. The Slowdown is your daily poetry ritual. In this episode, Major writes… “Today’s poem knows some environments awaken us daily to the wonders. Maybe that is paradise, a place of first permission to go on loving the world.” 'Celebrate the power of poems with a gift to The Slowdown today. Every donation makes a difference: https://tinyurl.com/rjm4synp
Today’s poem is Shelf Life by Nathan Xavier Osorio. The Slowdown is your daily poetry ritual. In this episode, Major writes… “There’s something sad, sometimes, about taking in all of the country from the fringes. I used to view the highway as a symbol of escape and possibility. Now, I view the road as a complex portal to our great melancholy. Today’s poem exposes a thin veil of desolation on the surface of life. It’s as if we are all waiting for something magical to happen, to lift us out of our collective spiritual anguish.” Celebrate the power of poems with a gift to The Slowdown today. Every donation makes a difference: https://tinyurl.com/rjm4synp
Today’s poem is Genetics by Sinead Morrissey. The Slowdown is your daily poetry ritual. In this episode, Major writes… “The speaker in today’s poem professes an emotional and physical connection to parents who chose to go separate ways. Understanding the power of sacred love, the speaker in the poem invites a beloved to embark on a shared life together.” Celebrate the power of poems with a gift to The Slowdown today. Every donation makes a difference: https://tinyurl.com/rjm4synp
Today’s poem is The Devouring Economy of Nature by Daniel Borzutzky. The Slowdown is your daily poetry ritual. In this episode, Major writes… “I know there is no easy solution to economic inequality. I do wish that we channeled greater energy into figuring out the wealth gap, how to provide sustainable wages to working people. One of the corrupting aspects of our economic system is that it forces us to accept conditions that reduce people and nature.” Celebrate the power of poems with a gift to The Slowdown today. Every donation makes a difference: https://tinyurl.com/rjm4synp
Today’s poem is After Vallejo by A.B. Spellman. The Slowdown is your daily poetry ritual. In this episode, Major writes… “Recently, I decided to be responsible and begin the process of creating a trust and establishing a will. I thought it morbid at first. Yet, planning the aftermath of my death empowered me. I don’t know when or where I will die. So having some say in that eventful day for me feels like a lavish gift to myself.” Celebrate the power of poems with a gift to The Slowdown today. Every donation makes a difference: https://tinyurl.com/rjm4synp
Today’s poem is Here We Are by Lauren K. Watel. The Slowdown is your daily poetry ritual.In this episode, Major writes… “Today’s poem begins from the idea that we yearn for connection and healing, but that our conflicts feel irreconcilable — to the point that we do not trust a future free of our trauma, grief, and suffering.” Celebrate the power of poems with a gift to The Slowdown today. Every donation makes a difference: https://tinyurl.com/rjm4synp
Today’s poem is Between You and You by Sham-e-Ali Nayeem. The Slowdown is your daily poetry ritual. In this episode, Major writes… “Writing can change the mind for the better. Poems shape our breathing, allow us to enter seas of consciousness that become part of the spontaneous energy of life. The improvised, spirited words in a poem are born out of a body free enough to let go.” Celebrate the power of poems with a gift to The Slowdown today. Every donation makes a difference: https://tinyurl.com/rjm4synp
Today’s poem is Post- by Corey Van Landingham. The Slowdown is your daily poetry ritual. In this episode, Major writes… “Today’s poem reminds me that life shapes us into authentic beings. Looking behind at our own journey can sometimes cause pain — but it can also liberate us.” Celebrate the power of poems with a gift to The Slowdown today. Every donation makes a difference: https://tinyurl.com/rjm4synp
Today’s poem is Home Movies: A Sort of Ode by Mary Jo Salter. The Slowdown is your daily poetry ritual. In this episode, Major writes… “With so much of our treasured moments digitized on servers, it seems we’ve lost physical evidence of our lives. Yet, we own thousands more photos of ourselves than our parents and grandparents. Like many, I wonder what will happen to the virtual record of our existence once we depart the earth.” Celebrate the power of poems with a gift to The Slowdown today. Every donation makes a difference: https://tinyurl.com/rjm4synp
Today’s poem is Taking Stock by Elaine Equi. The Slowdown is your daily poetry ritual. In this episode, Major writes… “Today’s poem invites us to find the balance between deepening our self-awareness and actually living life. Sometimes our journey means not letting that journey inhibit our sense of fun.” Celebrate the power of poems with a gift to The Slowdown today. Every donation makes a difference: https://tinyurl.com/rjm4synp
Today’s poem is from "Elegy for the Times" by Adonis, translated by Robyn Creswell. The Slowdown is your daily poetry ritual. In this episode, Major writes… “For stateless people, writing poems, taking pictures, composing songs is precarious, but making art happens, nonetheless. Often, it is a counter insistence of one’s presence on earth. Today’s poem is a humanizing statement of profound sorrow borne of conflict and exile.” Celebrate the power of poems with a gift to The Slowdown today. Every donation makes a difference: https://tinyurl.com/rjm4synp
Today’s poem is Vulture by Ted Kooser. The Slowdown is your daily poetry ritual.In this episode, Major writes… “Today’s poem invites us to attune, to notice, to hear what’s communicated beneath our words and bodies, to read the signs, even if what is heard or seen or felt bears an ominous message.” Celebrate the power of poems with a gift to The Slowdown today. Every donation makes a difference: https://tinyurl.com/rjm4synp
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United States
Absolutely perfect poem for US election day!
major is never wrong, but I think he might have missed the mark a bit on this one. I perceive this poem to be about consent
I've heard that woman and been that woman
Amazing poem, so raw and vivid. A splitting and spiralling many of us are familiar with.
Part of my morning routine. Thank you for your time and passion.
Yay first to comment! I use this podcast for a quick little meditation after my morning workout. it's fantastic.