Poets & Writers Theater

Watch this animated poem directed by Diego Maclean and narrated by Billy Collins, from the poet’s 1995 collection, The Art of Drowning (University of Pittsburgh Press).

“No matter the pull toward brink. No / matter the florid, deep sleep awaits. / There is a time for everything.” Ada Limón reads “Sorrow Is Not My Name” by Ross Gay and shares why this poem means so much to her for this new video series “The Poem I Wish I Had Read,” created by the Boutelle-Day Poetry Center at Smith College.

“In the dregs of August I watch the birds sprint,” begins Julian Randall in this reading of “Variation on a Theme of Genetics” from his debut collection, Refuse (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2018), for the Write About Now Poetry reading series in Houston. A Q&A with Nate Marshall by Randall is featured in the September/October issue of Poets & Writers Magazine. 

Julian Randall reads “On the Night I Consider Coming Out to My Parents” from his debut poetry collection, Refuse (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2018), in this Ours Poetica video produced by the Poetry Foundation in collaboration with Complexly. Randall is featured in “My MFA Experience” in the September/October issue of Poets & Writers Magazine.

“What are you? Where are you from? / I say, California, / but that’s not what they are looking for...” This Motionpoems film is an adaptation of Tiana Clark’s poem “The Ayes Have It,” directed by Savanah Leaf and narrated by Malina Tirrell. Clark is the author of I Can’t Talk About the Trees Without the Blood (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2018).

Daniel Borzutzky, who won the 2016 National Book Award in poetry for The Performance of Becoming Human (Brooklyn Arts Press, 2016), reads poems from the collection at a reading for the finalists hosted by the New School. Borzutzky’s forthcoming poetry collection, Lake Michigan (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2018), is a series of nineteen lyric poems.

“I know I can be long-winded sometimes. / I want so badly to rub the sponge of gratitude / over every last thing...” Ross Gay reads his poem “Catalog of Unabashed Gratitude” from his collection of the same name, published in 2015 by University of Pittsburgh Press, at the 2016 Split This Rock Poetry Festival in Washington, D.C.

“I see myself in the shadows of a leaf.” Afaa Michael Weaver reads his poem “Self Portrait” and Lucille Clifton’s poem “My Dream About God” for the P.O.P. series, which was shot and edited by Rachel Eliza Griffiths in partnership with the Academy of American Poets. Weaver’s poetry collection Spirit Boxing (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2017) is featured in Page One in the March/April issue of Poets & Writers Magazine.

“Could prose be an act of resistance against poetry?” In this video from the Academy of American Poets’ Poets Forum 2014, Toi Derricotte, author of The Undertaker's Daughter (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2011), discusses experiences with form in her writing.

“I’m making an argument with my body and the ground about our bodies and the ground.” At Harvard University’s Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study, Ross Gay, author of Catalog of Unabashed Gratitude (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2015), discusses the implications of being a black poet who writes about flowers in a lecture entitled “A Book of Flowers.”

"Caress what can't be blessed, cup shadows under breasts." Poet Sharon Dolin reads from her sixth collection, Manual for Living (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2016), which is featured in Page One in the March/April issue of Poets & Writers Magazine.

Rickey Laurentiis reads "Black Iris" from his poetry collection, Boy With Thorn (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2015), winner of the 2014 Cave Canem Prize. Laurentiis is one of the debut poets in "Fractures Through Time" in the January/February issue of Poets & Writers Magazine.

Ross Gay reads “To the Mulberry Tree” from his poetry collection Catalog of Unabashed Gratitude (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2015), which is a finalist for the 2015 National Book Award.

"Listen, to everything." Ross Gay speaks with Furious Flower's Elizabeth Hoover about line breaks, gardening, and his advice to young writers. Gay's latest poetry collection, Catalog of Unabashed Gratitude (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2015), is longlisted for the National Book Award.

Linda Källérus directed this video for the poem "Waltz of a Dream," from Nathalie Handal's latest collection Poet in Andalucia, published by the University of Pittsburgh Press in January. The music is from "Take This Waltz" by Leonard Cohen.