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“In my own writing, I feel safest when I’m farthest from what I know.” Tracy K. Smith reads “Digging” by Seamus Heney, the poem she feels “invited her to start writing poetry,” and from “My God, It’s Full of Stars,” a poem she wrote about her father. This video, part of the P.O.P. series, was shot and edited by Rachel Eliza Griffiths in partnership with the Academy of American Poets.
“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.
“Ginkgo, cottonwood, pin oak, sweet gum, tulip tree: / our emotions resemble leaves and alive / to their shapes we are nourished.” Arthur Sze reads his poem “The Shapes of Leaves” for Dear Poet, an educational project for the Academy of American Poets.
“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.
“Giving is, first and every time, hand to hand, / Mine to yours, yours to mine.” Alberto Ríos reads his poem “When Giving Is All We Have” as part of Dear Poet, an educational project for the Academy of American Poets.
“Then he lay down / to sleep like a snow-covered road / winding through pines older than him, / without any travelers, and lonely for no one.” Li-Young Lee reads his poem “Eating Together” for the Poetry Breaks series, videos filmed in the late 1980s and early 1990s by Leita Luchetti and brought back with the help of the Academy of American Poets.
“…all our cities twin cities, / all our states united…” In this vintage video from the Poetry Breaks series created by Leita Luchetti and presented in partnership with the Academy of American Poets, Sharon Olds reads her poem “Topography.”
In this P.O.P. series video, Douglas Kearney reads and discusses “Sound—Part 3 (Ostinato): All the World's Wars Commence in the Head” by Yona Harvey, and reads from “Tuesday Morning at Work.” The P.O.P. series was shot and edited by Rachel Eliza Griffiths in partnership with the Academy of American Poets.
“but she / notices distant jagged / zones on fire where the Company battles...” U.S. Poet Laureate Juan Felipe Herrera reads his poem “All the Thoughts at a Football Game” as part of Dear Poet, the Academy of American Poets’ educational project for National Poetry Month.
“You’re gonna pierce the page and you’re gonna pierce infinity.” U.S. poet laureate Juan Felipe Herrera discusses the art of revision at Poets Forum 2014 with Naomi Shihab Nye and C. D. Wright, as part of the Academy of American Poets’ Chancellors Conversations.
