Pop Poetry Podcast

Chapter One of Moby Dick

Jay Hennicke reads "First Fig" by Edna St. Vincent Millay First Fig by Edna St. Vincent Millay My candle burns at both ends; It will not last the night; But ah, my foes, and oh, my friends— It gives a lovely light!

John Muller reads "The Song of Wandering Aengus" by William Butler Yeats The Song of Wandering Aengus by William Butler Yeats I went out to the hazel wood, Because a fire was in my head, And cut and peeled a hazel wand, And hooked a berry to a thread; And when white moths were on the wing, And moth-like stars were flickering out, I dropped the berry in a stream And caught a little silver trout. When I had laid it on the floor I went to blow the fire a-flame, But something rustled on the floor, And someone called me by my name: It had become a glimmering girl With apple blossom in her hair Who called me by my name and ran And faded through the brightening air. Though I am old with wandering Through hollow lands and hilly lands, I will find out where she has gone, And kiss her lips and take her hands; And walk among long dappled grass, And pluck till time and times are done, The silver apples of the moon, The golden apples of the sun.

Ken Baumann reads "Rhotic Asphyxiation" by Sonya Vatomsky. Buy Sonya's full length debut, "Salt is for Curing" here: http://sator.press/ Rhotic Asphyxiation by Sonya Vatomsky The safest place to bury a body is in another body, is in your own body. Is your own dead body inside the one you present to the world, the one that still talks and walks across Pangea because that is how old it is, that is how old faking is. You were born fake as your body came out another fake body; you drank amniotic fluid shots in the belly of the body your mother swallowed when the world told her so and you breathed true body breath then and only then. A Russian girl can’t write a book without nesting dolls; burying ourselves in ourselves is in our blood, is in our mother’s blood. We birth, we bury, we swallow tongues down the body buried inside the body. Tongue is a delicacy you can serve at a funeral. The safest place to bury a body is at a funeral.

Aley Weld reads "The Universe" by May Swenson heres a version of the poem: http://www.wittyprofiles.com/q/6551954

Andrew Sinnes reads "13 Ways of Looking at a Blackbird" by Wallace Stevens Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird BY WALLACE STEVENS I Among twenty snowy mountains, The only moving thing Was the eye of the blackbird. II I was of three minds, Like a tree In which there are three blackbirds. III The blackbird whirled in the autumn winds. It was a small part of the pantomime. IV A man and a woman Are one. A man and a woman and a blackbird Are one. V I do not know which to prefer, The beauty of inflections Or the beauty of innuendoes, The blackbird whistling Or just after. VI Icicles filled the long window With barbaric glass. The shadow of the blackbird Crossed it, to and fro. The mood Traced in the shadow An indecipherable cause. VII O thin men of Haddam, Why do you imagine golden birds? Do you not see how the blackbird Walks around the feet Of the women about you? VIII I know noble accents And lucid, inescapable rhythms; But I know, too, That the blackbird is involved In what I know. IX When the blackbird flew out of sight, It marked the edge Of one of many circles. X At the sight of blackbirds Flying in a green light, Even the bawds of euphony Would cry out sharply. XI He rode over Connecticut In a glass coach. Once, a fear pierced him, In that he mistook The shadow of his equipage For blackbirds. XII The river is moving. The blackbird must be flying. XIII It was evening all afternoon. It was snowing And it was going to snow. The blackbird sat In the cedar-limbs.

Kathryn Ugoretz reads "Poem 670" by Emily Dickinson Emily Dickinson 670 One need not be a Chamber -- to be Haunted-- One need not be a House -- The Brain has Corridors -- surpassing Material Place Far safer, of a Midnight Meeting External Ghost Than its interior Confronting -- That Cooler Host For safer, through an Abbey Gallop, The Stones a'chase -- Than Unarmed, one's a'self encounter -- In lonesome Place -- Ourself behind ourself, concealed -- Should startle most -- Assassin hid in our Apartment Be Horror's least. The Body -- borrows a Revolver -- He bolts the Door -- O'erlooking a superior spectre -- Or More

voices to voices, lip to lip i swear (to noone everyone) constitutes undying; or whatever this and that petal confutes . . . to exist being a peculiar form of sleep what's beyond logic happens beneath will; nor can these moments be translated: i say that even after April by God there is no excuse for May - bring forth your flowers and machinery: sculpture and prose flowers guess and miss machinery is the more accurate, yes it delivers the goods, Heaven knows (yet are we mindful, though not as yet awake, of ourselves which shout and cling, being for a little while and which easily break in spite of the best overseeing) i mean that the blond absence of any program except last and always and first to live makes unimportant what i and you believe; not for philosophy does this rose give a damn . . . bring on your fireworks, which are a mixed splendor of piston and pistil; very well provided an instant may be fixed so that it will not rub, like any other pastel. (While you and i have lips and voices which are for kissing and to sing with who cares if some oneeyed son of a bitch invents an instrument to measure Spring with? each dream nascitur, is not made . . .) why then to Hell with that: the other; this, since the thing perhaps is to eat flowers and not to be afraid.